LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 

%{t + ._--.- §## ^ 

Shelf-HS-AB c 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



WANDERINGS 

IN 

BIBLE LANDS 



NOTES OF TRAVEL 

In Italy, Greece, Asia-Minor, Egypt, Nubia, 
Ethiopia, Cush, and Palestine, 

f 

By D. L. MILLER, 

Author of "Europe and Bible Lands." 




Mount Morris, III.: 
THE BRETHREN'S PUBLISHING COMPANY, 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1893, by 
D. L. MILLER, 
In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 




TABLE OF CONTENTS 




CHAPTER I. 

New York to Rome— Crossing the Atlantic— A Death at Sea.— The Rock of Gibral- 
tar.— Genoa, the Home of Columbus— Pisa, its Leaning Tower and Baptistry. . n 

CHAPTER II. 

Rome the Eternal City.— The Coliseum.— Christian Martyrs. — Catacombs.— The 
•Sleeping Places of the Dead.— Inscriptions.— The Fossor.— Decorations 3° 

CHAPTER III. 

Paul in Italy and Rome.— Puteoli.— Appii Forum and the Three Taverns— The Ap- 

pian Way 51 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Arch of Titus— The Golden Candlestick and Table of Showbread— St Peter's 
Cathedral— The Bronze Statue— St. Paul's Church.— The Portrait ol our Lord . 67 

CHAPTER V. 

From Rome to Naples.— Mount Vesuvius.— An Eruption 86 

CHAPTER VI. 

From Europe to Africa.— Last View of Vesuvius.— Stromboli.— Port Said.— The Suez 
Canal.— Ismailia.— Cairo.— Street Scenes.— Water-carriers 105 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Pyramid of Cheops.— Climbing the Great Pyramid.— View from the Top.— The 
Interior.— Grand Gallery.— The King's Chamber.— The Queen's Chamber.— The 
Sphinx.— The Granite Temple 119 

CHAPTER VIII. 

The Nile.— The Sakkieh and Shaduf— Memphis, the Noph of the Bible— Sakkara.— 
The Tombs. — Embalming the Dead.— The Serapeum.— The Temple of Tih.— 
The Step Pyramid —Our Southward Way 142 

CHAPTER IX. 

Nile Scenes.— Our Pilot.— The Natives and their Villages.— Death and Burial.— The 
School and the Schoolmaster.— The Doom Palm.— The Papyrus Reed.— Fulfill- 
ment of Prophecy 164 

CHAPTER X. 

Temples and Tombs.— Beni Hassan.— Immortality of the Soul.— Embalming— Tacob 
and Toseph Embalmed.— An Ancient Funeral Procession.— Rock-cut Tombs at 
Beni Hassan.— The Chamber of the Dead.— The Tomb of Ameni.— Allusion to 
the Famine • ■ : . 180 

CHAPTER XI. 

An Egyptian Sugar Factory.— Coptic Convent.— Tell el Amarna.— The Tablets, Let- 
ters from Adonizedek King of Jerusalem.— The Hebrew Invasion of Palestine.— 
Wonderful Testimony of the Truth of the Bible— Tell el Hesy Tablets . . .192 



iv 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XII. 

the Dead.-The Tombs of the Kings 

CHAPTER XIII. 

-Isaiah and Seti I.-A Visit to Ahmed Abd er-Rasul 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Destruction of his Host. . . • • • • 

CHAPTER XV. 

MaCl T^S Ca^nc'er -PCTsistmt MLchants.-The Nnonteter.-A Qute, 



Ride on'the Desert- The Famine of the Bible 

CHAPTER XVI. 

The Oonas._Ou r Panv for the ^^%^X^t^^ 
S ^To B^-t" the Tropic of 
Cancer -Dekkeh.-Our Boat Aground.-Korosko.-General Gordon a8a 

CHAPTER XVII. 
CHAPTER XVIII. 

a^d Vice -Beyond the Cataract.-Homeward Bound.-Egypt and the Prophets. 
—The Potter at his Wheel— Cairo again. • 

CHAPTER XIX. 

The Coptic Church.-The Banished Patriarch-An Interview w^his^Representa- 



> -The Doctrines of the Coptic Faith.-Trine Immersion and Feet-wasnmg. 
-Innovations.-A Church Difficulty .-Heliopolis.-An Ancient Sycamore Tree. 
The Tone Obelisk.-The Fulfillment of Prophecy.-Lack of Bible Knowledge. 333 

CHAPTER XX. 



tv. Mn^mmPdan Relision.-The Koran and the Bible Compared.-The Doctrines 
^S^eLfinParadi* and in Hell.-Hours of Praver.-The Der- 
oflslamism i e Mohammedan Unive rsity at Cairo.- 
^enTal cS T^L« and Students.-The Koran the Text-book.-Intellectual 
Condition of the Moslems 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

The Land of Goshen— Oppression of the Israelites— The Buried Cities of Egypt.— 
Pithom and the Bricks made by the Hebrews. — Bricks without Straw.— Tah- 
panhes and Jeremiah the Prophet.— The Daughters of Zedekiah— The Stones 
hid in the Brick Work.— Zoan.— The Burned Papyrus— Great Statue of Rame- 
sesll 36i 

CHAPTER XXII. 

The Land of Goshen.— The Sakkieh.— The Boundaries of Goshen— The Rich, Fer- 
tile Soil.— The Israelites and their Murmuring.— A long Donkey Ride— Raising 
Water with the Basket.— A Village Market.— Lost on the Desert.— The Beduin 
Sheik.— Wading in Mud and Water— The Donkey-boys.— Achmet Ali our Drag- 
oman.— A Sorrowful Man 384 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

The American Mission in Egypt.— A Funeral and a Wedding.— The Sakka.— Cairo 
to Alexandria.— The Delta.— The Arms of the Nile.— The Fair at Tanta— Alex- 
andria— The Septuagint.— The Introduction of Christianity.— The First Chris- 
tian School.— A great Library and its Destruction.— The Modern City.— Cata- 
combs.— Pompey's Pillar 404 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

Farewell to Cairo.— The Land of Goshen Again.— A Dusty Ride across the Desert. 
—Suez.— The Red Sea.— An Excursion to the Wells of Moses. — Israel's Song of 
Deliverance.— The Waters of Marah.— The Murmuring Host.— A Beautiful Oa- 
sis in the Desert.— The Corals of the Red Sea 419 



CHAPTER XXV. 

The Route of the Exodus.— Crossing the Red Sea.— Various Opinions as to the 
Place.— The Sinaitic Peninsula.— The Beduins and their Customs.— The Mur- 
muring Israelites— The Sinaitic Mountains.— The Mount of Moses.— The Plain 
of Assemblage.— Ras Sufsafeh, the Pulpit of the Law.— The Convent.— Tischen- 
dorf's Great Discovery.— A Happy Theologian 433 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

Leaving Suez.— Journeying to the Land of Canaan.— On the Canal Again.— Farewell 
to Egypt. — A Comforting Prophecy.— Jaffa.— Dangerous Landing.— Our Old 
Dragoman.— Suleiman the Boatman.— A Sample of Turkish Justice.— Improve- 
ments at Jaffa.— The Landing-place.— The Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway.— Com- 
merce.— House of Simon the Tanner.— Praying on the Housetop.— Flat Roofs.— 
Breaking up the Roof. — Continued Dropping on a Rainy Day. — The Grass on 
the Housetop and a Wasted Life.— Dorcas.— The Tanneries. — Wrecked Ships. 
—The Market-place— The Blind. 462 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

From Jaffa to Jerusalem.—" Blest Land of Judea." — Sentiment Destroyed. —Shar- 
on's Plain. — Plowing. — Lydda. — The Healing of Aeneas.— Ramleh.— A rich 
Land. — The Home of Samson. — The Foxes. — Mountain Scenery. — Terraced 
Hills. — The Shepherd and his Flock. — The Valley of Roses. — The Plain of 
Rephaim.— The Defeat of the Philistines.— Jerusalem.— A Contrast 490 



VI 



TABLE OF CONTENTS, 



5o5 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 
Jerusalem from Mount of Olives.-Walks about the Holy City.^The Jaffa Gate.- 
Scriptural Allusions.-Abraham.-Boaz.-Slaying of Abner m the Gate -Eh.- 
Absalom's Rebellion.-David's Great Sorrow.-The Gate a Symbol of Power.- 
Our Beggars.-Street Scene in Jerusalem.-The Minare t.-P^raymg Mos e ms.- 
A Mixed Multitude.— Lentiles.— Wine and Water Bottles.-The Milk Seller. . . 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

A Quiet Lord's Day.-The Last Supper.-Gethsemane -Mount of Olives.-Medita- 
tion.-David's Sorrow.-Solomon's Builders.-Caphvity -The Triumphant En- 
try into Jerusalem.-The Agony.-The Shadow of the Cross.-Abide with Me. . 52$ 

CHAPTER XXX. 

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem ."-The Desolation of Palestine.-A View from the Top 
of olivet -The Bright Arab Boy.-The Olives.-Bethany.-The Death and 
Resurrection of Lazarus.-A Cloud not Larger than a Man's Hand. 54i 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

Peculiar People.-The Jews a Persecuted Race.-Their Hopes of the Future -The 
Place of Wailing.-The Spoffords.-An Interesting Story .-Shipwreck.-Waitmg 
for the Coming of the Lord in Jerusalem.-Prophecy.-The New City.-The 
Tombs— The Ash Heap.- Wine Press.— Vineyards 55» 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

The Patriarch of Jerusalem.-An Interesting Interview.-Baptism.-Feet-washing.- 
The Division between Greeks and Latins.-Teaching of the Greek Church.- 
Number of Communicants ^74 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 
Homeward Bound.-Down to Jaffa.-The Last View of Canaan.-Mt. Carmel.-Eli- 
jah and Elisha.-Tyre and Sidon.- Antioch.-Tarsus.-Smyrna, and the Seven 
Churches of Asia.-Greece.-Athens.-Corinth.-Patros.-Rome Again.-Sailmg 
from Genoa— A Hurricane— New York S»4 



PREFACE. 



^^^TlNE years ago, with a considerable degree of reluc- 
]f&f| tance, the author was induced to publish a book 
^<$& of travels bearing the title, 44 Europe and Bible 
Lands." The work was received with so much favor 
that eleven editions were printed to meet the demand 
for it. From the many kind words written and spoken 
in regard to the book the author has been led to believe 
that some good resulted from its publication. 

And now, after the lapse of almost a half score of 
years, another journey has been made to the Lands of 
the Bible, another series of letters has been written and 
another book is to be sent out on its mission. The 
-question as to the good to be accomplished by a work 
of this kind has been anxiously considered by the writer. 
If no good is to come to humanity from it, then the 
time spent in travel and writing has been wasted. 

What if I have wandered through the ruined halls 
of Karnac and Luxor, gone , down into the Egyptian 
darkness of the Tombs of the Pharaohs, seen the first 
rays of the rising sun touch the statues of Rameses at 
Abou Simbel, and watched the stream of time from the 
top of the Great Pyramids? What if I have crossed the 
Land of Goshen and followed the fleeing Israelites across 
desert and sea and stood where Miriam sang the glad 
song of deliverance? What if I have visited and revis- 
ited the Holy City, walked in the courts of Solomon's 
Temple, knelt beneath the olive trees in Gethsemane, 
looked upon the tombs of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, 

vii 



v jii PREFACE. 

drunk from the Prophet's Fountain at Jericho, bathed in 
the pure water of Galilee, and wandered through all the 
Land of Promise? What if all this has been done? 
Surely the time has been wasted if no good to the 
church and to humanity is to come from it. But it is 
hoped that some good may result from these labors. 

The object sought in sending out this volume is 
to awaken a deeper interest in the study of the Bible 
and make our faith in the Word of God stronger. The 
Lands of the Bible are teeming with evidences of the 
truth of the Book of God. Almost daily the pickaxe of 
the excavator is revealing the records of the past, and 
infidelity is receiving its strongest blows from this source. 
A record of all the recent discoveries bearing upon the 
Bible story would fill many volumes: only the more im- 
portant find place here. 

Elder Joseph Lahman, of Illinois, accompanied the, 
writer on the journey to Egypt and the desert. He 
proved himself in all respects to be a true and trusty 
friend, a most agreeable and pleasant traveling compan- 
ion and a helpful associate. The plural form of the 
pronoun is used because the Elder was my inseparable 
companion. 

The author does not lay claim to scholarship or lit- 
erary training. Such as he has he gives. The critic 
will find errors in composition, but the statements made 
have been carefully examined and verified, and may be 
depended upon as being correct. 

The following excellent works have been consulted 
and used in the preparation of this work, and obligation 
to the various authors is acknowledged: 

"St. Paul's Footsteps in Rome," Forbes; "The Cata- 
combs," Forbes; "The Roman Catacombs," Northcote; 



PREFACE. 



ix 



"Pompeii," Rolfe; "Italy, Upper and Lower Egypt,'' 
Baedeker; "Through Bible Lands," Schaff; "The Nile," 
Budge; "A Thousand Miles up the Nile," Edwards; 
"Egypt To-day," Roe; "Ten Years Digging in Egypt," 
Petrie; "Monuments of Upper Egypt," Mariette Bey; 
"The Tell Amarna Tablets," Conder; "Ancient Egypt," 
Maspero; "Egypt Under the Pharaohs," Brugsch; "The 
Land of the Pharaohs," Manning; "History of Ancient 
Egypt," Rawlinson; "Biblical Researches," Robinson; 
"Boat Life in Egypt and Nubia," Prime; "The Ancient 
Egyptian," Wilkinson; "Eastern Life," Martineau; "The 
Great Pyramid," Ford; "A Miracle in Stone," Seiss; 
"The Pharaohs of the Bondage and Exodus," Rob- 
inson; "Pharaoh to Fellah," Bell; "The Land and the 
Book," Thomson; "Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway," Dr. 
Merrill; also to the Religious Tract Society, London, for 
illustrations. He is also under special obligations to 
Grant Mahan, of Mt. Morris College, for valuable as- 
sistance in proof reading and in preparing copy for the 
press, and to L. A. Plate for assistance in proof reading. 

In sending this volume out, the author expresses the 
hope that, under God's blessing, some good may result 
from its publication. If any one is led to read and ex- 
amine the Bible, and is thus brought into a closer com- 
munion with the Book of books, we shall feel that our 
long and fatiguing journey and the many weary hours 
spent over these letters were time and labor not spent 
in vain. 




Mount Morris, Ilfaiois, January I, 1894. 



List of Illustrations. 



Scenes in Egypt Frontispiece 

♦Interior of the Catacombs 37 

Entrance to one of the Catacombs . . 42 
A Gallery in one of the Catacombs . . 43 
Side View of an Ancient Sarcophagus . 46 

A Crypt in the Catacombs 4$ 

The Good Shepherd 49 

Representation of Loaves and Fishes . S° 
Puteoli, Paul's Landing-place in Italy 53 

Arch of Drusus 55 

Nero and Poppsea his wife. 59 

Circus of Nero, from a Coin ...... 62 

Portrait of Paul on a Glass Vase ... 62 

♦Columbaria in Rome 63 

An Inscription in the Catacombs ... 65 
*Arch of Titus, Showing Golden Can- 
dlestick and Table of Showbread . 69 

*Portrait of our Savior 77 

* An Excavated Street in Pompeii . . . 91 
*Cast from Mould of Human Figure . 95 

fGeneral View of Cairo 112 

fAn Egyptian Donkey Boy 116 

The Pyramids and the Sphinx .... 121 

Climbing the Great Pyramid 129 

Diagram of the Great Pyramid .... 131 

The Grand Gallery 134 

The Sphinx from the Northeast .... 137 
The Granite Temple, the Sphinx and 

the Great Pyramid 139 

Map of Egypt 140 

Map of Upper Egypt and Nubia ... 141 

♦The Shaduf 147 

*Statue of Rameses II 1 55 

Interior of Serapeum at Sakkara . . .159 
The Step Pyramid at Sakkara .... 162 

*Our Pilot on the Nile 165 

♦Egyptian Women with "Water Jars . . 175 
Ruins of an Ancient Temple in Egypt . 181 

Embalming 184 

Tell el Hesy Tablet (Front) 203 

Tell el Hesy Tablet (Back) 204 

fMoney-Changer at Assiut 207 

fSand-Storm in the Desert 211 

Defaced Wall Sculpture 212 

Cartouches of the Pharaohs 214 

The Great Hall at Karnac 216 

A Portion of the Temple at Karnac . . 219 
Shishak with Jewish Captives 222 



Entrance to the Empty Tomb of Seti I 22S 
♦Entrance to the Kings' Tombs at 



Thebes % . . 227 

Head of Rameses II 233 

The Mummy Head of Seti I ...... 237 

Mummy Head of Pharaoh 239 

Abd er-Rasul, Brugsch Bey, and Mas- 

pero 240 

The Pharaoh of the Exodus 236 

Outline of Statue of Menephthah . . . 258 
Interior of the Temple at Esneh . . .267 

View of the Temple at Edfou 270 

fThe Island of Philae 278 

Crocodiles on the Upper Nile 291 

Nubian Mud Huts 296 

The Nile Above the First Cataract . .298 

Front of Rock-cut Temple 301 

Rameses II slaying his Captives . . .305 

Group of Pharaoh's Prisoners 307 

Face of Smaller Temple 3 x o 

Head of Queen Nefertari 312 

Street in one of the Villages of Thebes 326 
fPortico of the Temple of Denderah . 327 

A Coptic Woman 335 

*The Obelisk at On 339 

fVilla and Garden near Cairo 342 

*The Howling Dervishes 353 

Group of Students and Teachers . . 338 
Visit of Semitic Family to Egypt . . .362 
Foreign Captives Making Brick .... 370 

fThe Ruins of Tanis 380 

♦The Sakkieh 385 

The Egyptian Ibis 393 

♦Raising Water with a Basket . . . . . 397 
♦The Sakka, Egyptian Water Carrier . 407 

♦The Wells of Moses 429 

Jebel Musa, Mount of Moses . . . • 45° 
Er-Rahah and Mount Sufsafeh .... 455 

♦A View on the Suez Canal 463 

♦The House of Simon the Tanner . . .479 

. Map of Palestine 489 

♦Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives . 507 

♦Street View in Jerusalem 5*5 

♦Mount of Olives from Golden Gate . . 529 

♦New Greek Church on Olivet 543 

♦The Jews' Wailing Place 561 

A Greek Priest 575 



♦Full-Page Half-Tone Engravings. fFacing Pages as indicated. 
10 



CHAPTER I 



New York to Rome.— Crossing the Atlantic.— A Death at Sea.— The 
Rock of Gibraltar.— Genoa, the Home of Columbus. — Pisa, its 
Leaning Tower and Baptistry. 

iUSffT this date, Nov. 12, 1892, in company with our 
' /fPp traveling companion, who shall be known as the 
Elder, we are on board the steamer Kaiser Wilhelm 
II, at the harbor in the City of New York, ready to set sail 
for the Old World. Ten days hence, if our voyage be 
prospered, we shall cast anchor off the rocks of Gibraltar, 
and two days later shall land at Genoa, Italy. A short time 
spent in Rome, a visit to Naples, Pompeii, Herculaneum 
and Vesuvius, and we take ship for Alexandria, Egypt. 
The winter will be spent on the Nile, the desert, and at Je- 
rusalem. The Seven Churches of Asia are also in the line 
of our travels, and we hope to travel extensively in the 
lands of the Bible before our return. Some months ago 
our wanderings in the Old World were interrupted by ill- 
ness and the prevalence of the cholera in some of the coun- 
tries we desired to visit. We turned our faces homeward, 
saying that if the way opened in the future we should go 
on with our work and try to finish it, the Lord so directing. 
So far as we can see with our limited vision, the way seems 
to be open, and we start upon our mission, trusting in God 
for the result. How much we shall be able to accomplish 
is known only to him into whose hands we commit all our 
ways. 



12 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



My dear wife, who has hitherto been my ever-constant 
companion, remains at home. Those who have felt the 
bitter pang of separation will know, others can only vague- 
ly imagine what this journey means to both of us. With 
a brave heart she said, " Go, for it seems to be best that I 
remain at home." And to-day, as I sail out upon the 
broad Atlantic, I realize that there are lonely, aching hearts 
at home. God be with them all until we shall meet again. 

The charm of travel, it has been said, is in prospect and 
retrospect. In the actual experience there are many things 
that are far from being pleasant. Separation from home 
and friends, danger and fatigue, with many vexations and 
annoyances, fall to the lot of all travelers. When the jour- 
ney has been made and the traveler is safe at home again, 
the vexations are forgotten and it is pleasant to look back 
and recall the enjoyable part of the trip. But as we write 
our ship is out at sea, and we bid farewell to home and 
country. 

Sea voyages have been described again and again, and 
descriptions will continue to multiply until there shall be 
no more sea. The great, restless ocean, bearing upon its 
bosom the navies and the commerce of the world, has al- 
ways had an absorbing interest for humanity. To those 
who stand on the shore and listen to the dying murmurs of 
the waves as they lose themselves on the sands of the 
beach, it has a strange fascination that is always strong, 
and a deep interest that is ever new. To those who go 
down to the sea in great ships, there is an added concern. 
The change from sunshine to clouds, from calm to storm, is 
watched with wonderful interest. Then, too, there is al- 
ways present with the traveler a dim, vague sense of uncer- 
tainty as to what the sea has in store for him. Many of 
the works of the Lord and the wonders of the deep are re- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



13 



vealed, and yet how .many mysteries are buried beneath the 
blue waves, and how many secrets are covered by the rest- 
less waters, never to be revealed until, at the command of 
him who holds all things in his hands, the sea shall give up 
her dead. 

And now we are off on our long journey. The great 
ship which is to bear us hence moves out of her dock, 
swings around upon the bosom of the river, glides like a 
thing of life down the smooth water of the bay, passing the 
lower forts, bristling with cannon for the defense of the 
principal port of our country, and we are out upon the 
broad waters of the Atlantic Ocean. We stop a moment to 
drop our pilot, and the last connecting link with country, 
homes and loved ones is severed, and we must now look for 
news from home on the other shore. In twelve days, if the 
Lord prosper our voyage, we hope to cast anchor and land 
at Genoa, Italy, four thousand, three hundred miles away. 

Sailing out upon the great deep on this cloudy Novem- 
ber day, we wonder what the sea has in store for us. Shall 
we be driven hither and thither, and tossed by the stormy 
wind? Shall we reach our desired haven in safety? The 
sea holds her own secrets, and the rippling waves whisper 
not of what she will bring to the wanderers, but hope ever 
singing in the heart says, "All will be well." 

Thoughts like these doubtless came to each of the one 
hundred and five cabin passengers on board the Kaiser 
Wilhelm as we stood on deck, taking a last glimpse of our 
native land. In that company stood an unseen and unwel- 
come form. The angel of death brooded over the ship and 
marked one of our number for his own. Before we had 
been at sea ten hours a young man who had said farewell 
to father and mother at the dock in New York had ended 
his earthly voyage. He had been sitting in one of the deck 



!4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

rooms, and at ten o'clock he said: " I will go down to my 
room." When he reached the lower deck he sank down, 
and before the ship's doctor reached him he was dead. 
Heart failure and hemorrhage were the immediate causes 
of his death. The sudden and unexpected death cast a 
gloom over the ship's company and this was increased 
when, on Sunday morning, it was announced that the body 
would be buried at sea. As the sun sank behind the west- 
ern clouds, bathing sea and sky with the tints of red and 
gold, preparations were made to give the lifeless form to 
the waves. A platform was fastened to the side of the 
ship, and all the arrangements were completed. It was sad 
to think of this burial, and of the stricken hearts in that 
far-away New England home when the news of the death 
and burial of their only son should reach them. At the 
last moment the efforts of some of the passengers were 
successful. They guaranteed the payment of all ex- 
penses. The body was embalmed and will be carried to 
Genoa, and then sent back to New York. 

This act of loving-kindness on the part of strangers 
makes our faith in humanity stronger. It is one of those 
acts, so wholly unselfish and disinterested, that come only 
from a desire to obey the golden rule, and it shall in no 
wise lose its reward. And so, at the last moment, the sea 
was robbed of its prey, and the friends at home will have 
the sorrowful satisfaction of laying the body of their boy in 
the family tomb. 

He was the only child, the joy of a mother's heart, the 
hope of a father's declining years, gone never to return 
again. In that home father and mother are anxiously wait- 
ing for news from their boy, and when the cable flashes the 
news back from the shores of Spain, it will carry a sad, sad 
story; for to them 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 1$ 

" The wind of the sea is the waft of death, 
The waves are singing a song of woe; 
By silent river, by moaning sea, 
Long and vain shall the watching be; 
Never again shall the sweet voice call, 
Never the white hand rise and fall! "* 

We turn away from this sad picture with heartfelt 
sympathy for the stricken home. But the sudden appear- 
ance of death in our midst left upon all an impression that 
will not soon be forgotten. Surely, in the midst of life we 
are in death! 

In planning our present trip to the Bible Lands, we 
aimed to take the most direct route from New York to Port 
Said, Egypt. Instead of going to Northern Europe, we 
took a more southerly course which will carry us by the 
Azores Islands to the Strait of Gibraltar. Heretofore we 
have landed at Bremen, Germany, fifty-two degrees North 
Latitude. On this trip we shall catch our first glimpse of 
the Eastern Continent when we sight Cape St. Vincent, the 
southern point of Portugal, fifteen degrees south of Bre- 
men. 

Two points are gained in taking this southern route. 
We gain time. We are anxious to spend as much of the 
winter and spring in Egypt and Palestine as possible. The 
other point, not so important but not to be overlooked, is, 
that by taking the southern route we escape the heavy win- 
ter storms of the North Atlantic. Having had an experi- 
ence last December as to what a winter hurricane on the 
ocean means, we have no desire to try another. Our curi- 
osity in that direction has been more than satisfied. 

At this writing, Nov. 21, having been at sea nine days, 
we can say that our anticipation of a pleasant voyage has 
thus far been fully realized. The weather has been delight- 
fully pleasant. Sunshine and clear skies, with warm, 



i6 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



balmy bree2es have been the order of the days as they have 
gone by. It has been altogether one of the finest of our 
five Atlantic voyages. For two days we had the swells of 
the ocean, caused by a great storm that passed north of us, 
and we were literally " rocked in the cradle of the deep." 
Judging from the great, heaving swells that bore down up- 
on us, the storm to the north must have been very severe. 
We were glad to escape with only two days of rocking and 
rolling. 

When the swells were heaviest, we were standing on 
deck, looking over the rail at the dark waters below. A 
number of passengers, ladies mostly, were sitting in steam- 
er chairs, ranged along and fastened to the inner and upper 
side of the deck. The chairs are made on the principle 
of an invalid's extension chair so that, when sitting down, 
one is in a half-reclining posture. The passengers were en- 
joying the refreshing evening breeze, and were protected 
by having heavy shawls or traveling blankets thrown over 
the lower part of the body. Suddenly a mighty swell bore 
down upon the ship and she rolled over until the deck 
stood at an angle of at least forty-five degrees. As a result 
the luckless passengers slid from their chairs down the in- 
clined deck and piled up at the ship's railing. A good 
deal of screaming was heard, but fortunately no one was in- 
jured. After this incident the deck was very soon de- 
serted. 

The Elder proves to be a good seaman, having suf- 
fered very little from seasickness, and seems to enjoy his 
first ocean voyage quite well. Barring the sad incident re- 
ferred to at the beginning of our voyage, our journey 
has been as pleasant as could be hoped for under the 
circumstances. We thank the Lord for his protecting care 
over us, and trust to him for a continuance of the blessings 
which we have thus far enjoyed, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



17 



To-day we cast anchor in the open roadstead off the 
Rock of Gibraltar, and our Atlantic voyage is ended. We 
have a thousand miles or less to sail on the Mediterranean 
before reaching Genoa, where we shall land; but here we 
pass from the Atlantic Ocean and sail upon the blue waters 
of the " Great Sea." No sooner is the anchor down than 
our ship is surrounded by small boats, laden with oranges, 
tangerines, figs and other semitropical fruits, and the vend- 
ers call out, in a jargon of English, Italian and Spanish, the 
price of the commodities they have for sale. At first it was 
a question with us as to how they were to reach the passen- 
gers who stood twenty feet above them on the deck of the 
ship. But the problem was soon solved. A rope was 
thrown up to and caught by the would-be purchaser, a bas- 
ket was attached, and a means of communication was at 
once established. The purchaser put his money into the 
basket, the boatman replaced it with the articles desired, 
and in this way a brisk trade was kept up for several hours. 

The Rock of Gibraltar, the strongest natural fortress in 
the world, is an immense cliff, composed of limestone, 
dense gray marble, and red sandstone, some three miles in 
length, one thousand, four hundred and thirty feet high, 
and about six miles in circumference. It fell into the 
hands of the English in 1704, and since then England has 
held the key to the Mediterranean Sea. In 1779 France 
and Spain besieged the Rock, and, although they kept up 
the siege four years, were at last obliged to give it up. 
The garrison consists of five thousand men in time of 
peace, with quarters for a hundred thousand when necessity 
requires. A constant food supply for five years is stored 
away on the Rock. The hillside is pierced with cave-like 
openings, from each of which the muzzle of a cannon is 
faintly discerned. On the highest point of the mountain is 



18 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



a battery of one hundred ton guns. It requires four hun- 
dred and fifty pounds of powder for a single charge for 
each of these monster implements of death and destruc- 
tion. On the west side the rock stands on a narrow pla- 
teau, and on this and the sloping hillside the town of Gib- 
raltar is built. To the east the cliffs rise like giant walls 
from the sea. The entire aspect of the place is that of sol- 
itude and inaccessibility. It stands like a huge sentinel, 
keeping everlasting watch over the waters of the sea, nat- 
ure's own impregnable fortress. 

Hoisting anchor, we sail through the Straits with the 
guns of the rock frowning down upon us. To the south 
from ten to twenty miles away is the clearly-outlined coast 
of Africa, where the Atlas Mountains raise a natural bul- 
wark against the sea. Turning the point of the rock we 
have the coast of Spain laid out in panoramic view before 
us. All day we coast along these beautiful shores. The 
snow-covered heights of the Sierras glisten like great 
domes of silver in the bright sunlight. The sky is marvel- 
ously clear, and its blue tint is deepened in contrast with 
the darker waters of the sea. A gentle breeze, warmed by 
"Africa's burning sand," is borne lazily to us from the 
south, breaking the waters into myriads of ripples, which 
sparkle in the clear light of the sun, as if the diamonds of 
the world were set in the crest of each tiny wavelet. On 
such a sea, with such surroundings, one might sail on for- 
ever, forgetting the storms which lash the waters to fury 
and bring swift destruction to many hapless mariners. But 
as we write the sun drops into the western sea, leaving a 
pathway of glory behind him. The light fades away, the 
hills of Spain are seen only in dim outline as the darkness 
comes down over land and sea, and our day-dream is 
ended. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



ig 



Two days and a half we sail along the shores of Spain, 
France, and Italy; the sea as smooth as glass, the weather 
most delightful, and then we cast anchor in the beautiful 
harbor of " Genova La Superba," as the Italians call the 
City of Genoa. The boat of the health officer comes 
alongside, and, upon hearing that we have had a death on 
board, the officer says he must send the doctor to examine 
us in the morning. We are quarantined for the night. 
They remember that there were rumors of cholera at New 
York and are extra careful. As we have a clean bill of 
health we shall land early in the morning. 

Before leaving the Kaiser Wilhelm, which has been 
our home for nearly two weeks, let us look about us and 
learn something of our floating house. Very few persons 
have an idea of the cost at which these leviathan steam- 
ships are maintained. Ships of the class of the Kaiser, 
Majestic and New York have a capacity for carrying two 
thousand passengers. In other words, you might place in 
one of these great ocean steamers the entire population of 
a good-sized country town, with all their personal effects, 
and transport them very comfortably to the other side of 
the ocean. The amount of food required to feed the pas- 
sengers is very great. The steward of one of the great 
lines gives the following statement as to provisions: 

" If I were stocking the ship I would store away ten 
thousand to twelve thousand pounds of fresh beef just as 
you see it hanging in front of butcher shops in Ameri- 
ca. Then five thousand pounds of mutton and lamb — it 
all comes off the same piece, you know — one thousand 
pounds of corned beef, two hundred smoked hams, one 
thousand, five hundred dressed chickens or hens, as the 
case might be, three thousand pounds of fish, and six hun- 
dred pounds of bacon. Now we come to the delicacies, — 



20 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

big- sacks of smoked tongues, dried beef, dried and smoked 
fish, salmon and halibut principally. Of the fresh fruits we 
take thirty thousand pounds of tomatoes, pears, oranges, 
peaches, bananas, watermelons, plums, cherries, grapes, and 
all other dainties which may be found in any strictly first- 
class hotel. Now come the tinned (canned) goods. We 
have enough in stock always to furnish a grocery store in 
a respectably-sized town. Several tons of canned sardines, 
potted meats of all description, peaches, apricots, pears, 
apples, Boston baked beans— in fact, everything under the 
sun that is preserved in cans can be found in my store- 
room. Then we come to the relishes, sauces, and pickles 
of all descriptions, besides fresh garden roots, such as cel- 
ery, radishes, etc. Thousands of pounds of coffee, tea, 
chocolate, and cocoa, together with other beverages, are 
consumed. 

" I'm not through yet. We can use up three car-loads 
of potatoes, beets, parsnips, carrots, cabbages, etc. Now 
we will add one thousand dozen eggs, twenty barrels of 
sugar, more or less, two tons of butter, half a ton of lard, 
and condensed milk enough to make a pond big enough to 
float the ship. Barrel after barrel of flour has its head 
knocked in on the trip, and there are numerous other small 
stores which are indispensable." 

It costs twenty-five thousand dollars to propel a large 
ocean steamer across the Atlantic. This sum pays the 
crew, which numbers two hundred and seventy-five men, 
and the balance goes into numerous other departments. 
From the captain to the lowest subordinate every one 
knows his place and everything runs like clockwork. The 
captain is supreme in command, and his word is law. But 
instead of being a tyrant he is usually a genial, kind- 
hearted man. Captain Stormer of the Kaiser is one of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



21 



these kind-hearted men. He has unlimited faith in his 
ship, and inspires confidence in those who sail with him. 
He is kind to his men and is constantly looking after the 
comfort of his passengers. 

A visit to the engine-room and stokehole of the ship 
is full of interest. The chief engineer, who is always a 
well-informed man, is ready to give information. He tells 
us that " a big ship burns two thousand, five hundred tons 
of coal for a round trip. It requires about one-third more 
of American bituminous coal to cross the ocean than it 
does when Welsh coal is used. Different makes of en- 
gines require different quantities of coal. The Majestic 
of the White Star line runs across with about two hundred 
tons consumed daily, while the Etruria of the Cunard 
line, though a smaller and slower ship, will burn three hun- 
dred and twenty tons. It is interesting to know that the 
Cunard company burns from five hundred thousand to six 
hundred thousand tons of coal yearly. 

" The engines of a steamship under full steam make 
sixty to eighty revolutions a minute, four thousand and 
eight hundred an hour, and a total each trip of about seven 
hundred thousand revolutions. Away down in the bowels 
of a great ship the stokers work, naked to the waist, and so 
dirt-begrimed with soot, coal dust, ashes, and perspiration 
that they look like natives of Africa. It may look easy to 
shovel coal, but it is a trade, like everything else, to do it 
right. They work four hours on and eight hours off in 
heat which ranges from one hundred and twenty degrees 
to one hundred and sixty degrees and once in a while high- 
er. The stokers are the firemen who shovel the coal into 
the furnaces, and it keeps them busy to keep the fires reg- 
ulated. Each one has four furnaces to look after. He has 
to keep an eye on his coal trimmers, the fire boxes, and the 



22 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

steam gauges. At the end of a trip they are pretty badly 
used up. Legs or arms sprained, hide knocked off by 
chunks of coal, arms scalded by steam or burned with ash- 
es and clinkers when they are cleaning out the fire-bars. 

" Then the coal trimmers or passers have a rough time 
of it wheeling coal and dumping it at the feet of the stok- 
ers. It requires the skill of an acrobat to keep his feet 
with the ship rolling and pitching, and many a shin is 
barked and an arm sprained among these hard working 
slaves." 

Let us go down into the heart of the ship where its 
motive power is throbbing and pulsating with the regular- 
ity of the human organ. Going down the narrow, steep, 
iron stairways, amidst a great confusion of machinery, we 
stand at length on the bottom of the vessel. We were 
never so strongly impressed with the meaning of the word 
power, as applied to machinery, as when we stood looking 
at the ponderous engines, every stroke of which represent- 
ed a power equal to that of ten thousand horses. We crept 
through a narrow gallery, with the machinery in motion all 
around us, to where the great shaft, running from the cen- 
ter to the stern of the ship, to which the propeller is at- 
tached, was rotating with great rapidity and with the regu- 
larity of clockwork. The shaft is nearly two feet in diame- 
ter and is made of the best steel. It is a difficult matter to 
manufacture a steel shaft of such great dimensions without 
a flaw, and the greatest skill is required to produce the best 
results in shaft casting. We notice that all the bearings of 
the shaft, and of the heavy machinery, in addition to being 
well oiled, have a constant stream of cold water pouring up- 
on them. This serves to keep the machinery from heating. 
A number of assistant engineers are constantly looking at 
the machinery, all parts of which undergo frequent and 
careful inspection. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



2 3 



From the engine-room we enter the boiler rooms where 
thirty-six fierce fires render the air stifling hot, and it seems 
almost unendurable, but by standing near the great venti- 
lating pipe we were enabled to examine the place. Six im- 
mense double-end boilers, made of one and one-eighth inch 
steel, each with a capacity of nearly two thousand horse 
power and heated by thirty-six furnaces, supply the motive 
power to the engines. Here are men black and grimy, 
shoveling coal into the furnaces. A full supply of coal for 
a voyage is taken on board at New York, and this, with a 
surplus of three hundred tons for a case of necessity, makes 
the total coal supply for a passage across the Atlantic near- 
ly two thousand tons, enough to supply an ordinary-sized 
village with fuel for an entire year. A look into the partly 
empty coal room gave us a very good idea of the great 
width and depth of the ship. A coal bin for two thousand, 
five hundred tons— just think of it! Allowing twenty tons 
to a car-load it would take more than four trains of twenty- 
five cars each to move the coal supply of the Kaiser for 
one trip. 

Coming up from the depths of the ship we were glad 
to breathe the fresh, pure sea air again. But we were im- 
pressed with the thought that in the very heart of the ship 
was hidden away from the eyes of the casual observer a 
force great enough to compass the almost immediate de- 
struction of the vessel. The explosion of a boiler in mid- 
ocean would result in a lost ship, and no one would be left 
to tell the story. The thought is not a pleasant one, and 
we will not pursue it further, but it is certainly one of the 
weak points in naval architecture. 

Disembarking we set our feet on the shores of sunny 
Italy and enter the City of Genoa. It is one of the most 
important cities on the Mediterranean and has a permanent 



2 4 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



population of two hundred and ten thousand. It is beauti- 
fully situated on the hills around about the bay into which 
more than sixteen thousand ships, from the different parts 
of the world, enter annually. It also has the distinction of 
having been, at one time, the home of Columbus, the dis- 
coverer of America, the four hundredth anniversary of 
which event was recently celebrated in the United States. 
The house in which this distinguished navigator lived is 
pointed out to travelers. The city has many handsome 
houses and villas, the homes of the Genoese nobility, which 
give one a very good idea of the architecture of the past 
centuries. 

We spend one day in Genoa before going on to Rome 
by way of Pisa. The change from our own home life to 
that of Italy is a marked one. Language, dress, manners 
and customs are all so entirely different from what we are 
used to that we are reminded on every hand that we are in 
a foreign land, that we have indeed left our own country 
and are in the Old World. It is not entirely new to the 
writer, but to the Elder it has all the novelty of a first ex- 
perience, which, unfortunately, we can fully enjoy only 
once in this world. 

We start out to see something of our new surround- 
ings, and as we leave the door of our hotel, we are at once 
accosted by several of the natives, who have picked up a 
smattering of the English and are anxious to serve us in 
the capacity of guides and interpreters. They press their 
claims in a mixture of English and Italian which is wholly 
unintelligible to us. One who speaks English fairly well 
follows us a considerable distance, insisting that he is a 
good "guida" and speaks "Inglese vara well." We put 
together part of what he said, and here it is as it sounds to 
us: " Me speeka vara good Inglese, vara good guida, Vill 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 25 

show you ze palais of ze great Cristofo Colombo; vill show 
you ze whole Genovo; only four francs." We conclude to 
risk our own very limited knowledge of the Italian, and so 
dismiss our would-be guide with a polite no and a wave of 
the hand. 

It is remarkable how well one can get along in a for- 
eign land if he is acquainted with but a few words of the 
language spoken. The following incident will illustrate 
this point. The Elder wanted to purchase a trunk strap. 
Passing along the street we came to a shop where the de- 
sired article was seen. We walked in, pointed to the strap, 
and said to the shopkeeper, " Quanto" (how much) ? He 
replied, " Tre franco" (three francs). We paid the money, 
took the strap, and went our way. Only three words were 
used in this transaction, and these were all that were need- 
ed. How many words we waste in this world! Words are 
valuable only as they express ideas, and the most effective 
expression, as a rule, comes from the fewest words, paying 
due deference to clearness. Ministers and writers make a 
great mistake when they fill in with words instead of ideas, 
and how apt we are to fall into this very common error! 
The reason is not hard to find: ideas are scarce, words are 
plenty. 

The Campo Santo, literally, Holy Field, or Camp of 
. the Saints, as the Genoese call their cemetery, is one of the 
attractions of the city. The name is beautiful and fitting 
when applied to the last resting-place of the people of 
God, but as this is the one great burial-place of Genoa we 
doubted the appropriateness of the name. 

The entire ground is surrounded by a high wall, on the 
inner side of which is a double row of corridors, formed by 
columns which support the arched roof. The corridors 
are wide enough for double rows of graves and open out 



26 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



upon the cemetery proper. Judging from the rich and lav- 
ish display of decorations, only the wealthy find a resting- 
place in the vaults beneath the pavements of the corridors. 
The poor are laid to rest in the ground enclosed by the 
walls. 

The most profuse display in sculptured marble, much 
of it in bad taste, so it seemed to us, adorns the corridors 
from end to end. It is placed in niches in the wall and be- 
tween the columns, and gives the interior the appearance 
of great galleries of sculpture. A description of a single 
group will give an idea of the realistic character of the 
work and show the taste displayed. In one of the large 
circular spaces a large sarcophagus of black marble, beauti- 
fully polished, is placed on a platform. On top of it 
stands a life-size figure of the dead husband and father, cut 
from pure white marble. At one end of the coffin is the 
kneeling figure of the wife and mother; at the other end 
that of a son, a young man of about twenty years. Both 
are life-size and lifelike. Their faces are the very pictures 
of grief. On the mother's eyelid trembles a tear-drop. 
Her modern dress, with her widow's lace cap and her lace 
collar are all exquisitely cut in the white marble. The son 
is represented in a fashionable dress suit; his left hand, 
thrown behind him, holds his round derby hat. The work 
was done by a master hand, but it seemed to us an unseem- 
ly display, and the details of the dress, so carefully worked 
out, were not in keeping with the sorrow-stricken faces. 

There are hundreds of pieces of statuary of a similar 
character in the corridors, some of which are even more 
inharmonious than the one described. Altogether the 
Campo Santo of Genoa is one among the most remarkable 
modern cemeteries in Europe. 

From Genoa we journey to Rome by railroad, a dis- 
tance of some three hundred miles, On the way we pass 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



27 



through Pisa where we stop long enough to visit the Lean- 
ing Tower and the celebrated Baptistry, both objects of 
considerable interest to travelers. 

The baptistry was built about A. D. 11 50, and was con- 
structed especially for the administration of the rite of 
Christian baptism. The building is circular in form and is 
built entirely of marble. It is one hundred feet in diame- 
ter and a hund red and ninety feet to the top of the conical- 
shaped dome which covers it. Below it is surrounded with 
fine marble columns and decorated with statuary. In the 
interior, exactly in the center beneath the dome, is the pool 
with fonts for bapcism. The pool is made large enough for 
immersion, and deep enough to immerse the candidate 
when in a kneeling posture. It is a fact so well known that 
we need scarcely refer to it, that, until about the beginning 
of the fourteenth century, the Roman church followed the 
commission given by Christ, and baptized by trine immer- 
sion. This was the almost universal practice up to the 
foregoing date. And here, in this old baptistry at Pisa, the 
rite was performed in that way until the change was made 
to sprinkling and pouring. 

The church of Rome claims the right to make changes 
of this kind when, in the judgment of the Pope and his 
councilors, it is proper to do so. In 1854 the dogma of the 
immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary was promulgat- 
ed, and in 1870 the doctrine of the infallibility of the Pope 
was made an article of the Roman Catholic faith. Just as 
these new doctrines were set forth by the authority of the 
Pope and the council, so the change was made from trine 
immersion to sprinkling and pouring. Luther, in his ref- 
ormation, made an effort to re-establish trine immersion, 
but failed, because he did not wholly free himself from the 
Roman practice of sprinkling. All the Protestant churches 



28 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

that practice sprinkling are following the mandates of 
Rome. John Wesley recognized this and preferred to bap- 
tize by trine immersion, according to the commission given 
by Christ. In proof of this we quote as follows: ''When 
Mr. Wesley baptized adults, professing faith in Christ, he 
chose to do it by trine immersion, if the person would sub- 
mit to it, judging this to be the apostolic method of baptiz- 
ing." (Moore's "Life of Wesley," Vol. I, p. 425-) 

The pool and fonts in the baptistry at Pisa are beauti- 
fully constructed of marble, highly polished and inlaid 
with various colored stones. It is an octagon in shape, and 
each of its eight sides is decorated with figures in bas- 
relief. It is a fine piece of work and shows great artistic 
taste in its construction. The building is also remarkable 
for its wonderful echo. The attendant sang a few notes in 
a deep, rich tone, and, by the watch, the sound was heard 
twelve seconds, echoing and re-echoing softer and softer, 
until it died away in a whisper in the top of the lofty 
dome. A pulpit, constructed in the eleventh century, 
stands at one side of the baptistry. It is also of marble, 
and is a fine piece of work. Owing to the echo, we con- 
cluded that it would be a difficult place in which to preach 
a sermon. 

The Leaning Tower of Pisa, about which every school- 
boy has read, is, in its way, one of the wonders of the 
world. It is one hundred and seventy-nine feet high, and 
its inclination is thirteen feet from the perpendicular. It 
is ascended by a winding stairway of two hundred and 
ninety-four steps. We climb to the top and experience a 
very peculiar sensation. The slant is a regular one, and in 
walking up and around the tower, we can not free ourselves 
from the feeling that it may fall over. The top is flat and 
is surrounded by an iron railing. The slant is quite 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



29 



marked on top, and very few persons care to walk to the 
lower side and look over. A plumb, dropped from this 
side at the top, would strike the ground thirteen feet from 
the base line of the foundation. Looking over the railing 
at the lower side, the sense of insecurity is so strong that 
we start back, feeling that the addition of our weight to 
the overhanging wall may cause it to topple over. It was 
here that Galileo made his celebrated experiments regard- 
ing the laws of gravitation. 

From Pisa to Rome we journeyed by night, reaching 
the " Eternal City " at midnight. Our first day in Rome, 
Sunday, Nov. 27, was partly spent in trying to find a 
church where we might hear English preaching. We se- 
cured a cab and driver, — cab fares are very cheap here, 
twenty cents for two persons for a drive anywhere within 
the city walls, — and gave him instructions where to drive. 
After a long drive he stopped and pointed to a doorway. 
We entered and found a Baptist church, with services con- 
ducted in Italian. Of course we were disappointed. We 
spent several hours in walking through the winding streets 
before we reached our hotel again. 

Rome and its Christian Antiquities will be the subject 
of several letters to follow this. We are now in one of the 
cities of the Bible. Here it was that " Paul dwelt two 
whole years in his own hired house, and received all that 
came unto him, preaching the kingdom of God, and teach- 
ing those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with 
all confidence, no man forbidding him." Here he labored 
in word and doctrine, and here he gave his life to the cause 
of Christ. 



CHAPTER II. 



% 

Rome the Eternal City —The Coliseum.— Christian Martyrs— Cata 
combs— The Sleeping Places of the Dead —Inscriptions — The Fos- 
sor. — Decorations. 

T one time in its history a visit to the City of Rome 
was considered a great event in the lives or those 
who were fortunate enough to see the Eternal City. 
This idea grew into a proverb, ''See Rome and 
die," which would indicate that after seeing the City of the 
Csesars nothing else in this world would be worth seeing. 
In our own days of rapid traveling, when we may girdle the 
world in sixty days, a visit to Rome has but little more 
than the commonplace in it. And yet for those who come 
within her gates not for pleasure, but to read the history of 
the past, she has wonderful lessons to reveal. It is to 
study some of these lessons that we are spending some time 
in the City of Seven Hills. 

Rome, once the proud mistress of the world, occupies 
such a vast place in both religious and political history 
that she has been for centuries past, and for years to come 
will continue to be, one of the great centres of the world's 
travel. In the days of her greatest prosperity and power, 
under the first Caesars, it was said that " all roads lead to 
Rome," and the golden milestone set up in the Forum was 
the centre of her great empire, and she ruled nearly all the 
known world; so to-day all lines of travel converge in 
Rome. 

30 




WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



31 



One of the most fruitful sources of the great mass of 
people who visit the city annually is the great church of 
which she is the center. Two hundred million of the 
earth's inhabitants are Roman Catholics, and, no matter 
what we may think or believe about it, every one of them 
regards his spiritual ruler who dwells on the banks of the 
Tiber in the great Vatican Palace as the successor of Peter 
and Christ's legal representative on the earth. Holding 
this faith, but few of those who are able to do so fail to vis- 
it Rome once or more in their lifetime. 

But we are not so much interested in the Rome of the 
present as in the Rome of the past, — the Rome which Paul 
knew, the Rome which ruled the world when Christ was 
born. And where shall we look for the city of the past? 
Not in the life and bustle of the modern city, but amid her 
own mighty ruins, crumbling to the dust inch by inch as 
the years roll on. We wander over the steps of broken 
thrones and shattered altars, we plod our way among the 
prostrate columns of marble temples, once the pride of em- 
perors and kings, now overthrown and covered with the 
moss of centuries. We thread our way through the mass of 
ruins, finding here and there an ancient temple still pre- 
served, standing as a landmark and bearing testimony as to 
what the city was in her glory. Everywhere we find the 
dust of ages clinging to her ruins, and the owls and the 
bats flit about in what were once her pleasant palaces. We 
are reminded of the words of Byron: 

"The Niobe of nations! there she stands 

Childless and crownless in her voiceless woe; 
An empty urn within her withered hands, 
Whose sacred dust was scattered long ago." 

To day we stand on the Palatine Hill where once stood 
the magnificent palace of Tiberius, who ruled Rome when 



32 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

her empire was at the height of its glory. Our mind goes 
back to a little village in an obscure Roman province, 
where a babe was born and laid in a manger. It was the 
Babe of Bethlehem, whose kingdom should be established 
and whose reign should continue after Rome's mighty tem- 
ples had crumbled to dust. When Christ, the King, was 
born, the palace of Tiberius stood on the height where we 
walk to-day. It was most magnificent in all its propor- 
tions, and grand beyond description in its decorations. 
Within its marble halls every luxury that human ingenuity 
could invent and the wealth of the world could purchase 
was enjoyed by the royal household. Nearly nineteen cen- 
turies have passed away; the palace has gone with them. 
No trace of it is to be seen to-day. We walk beneath the 
shade of the eucalyptus and pepper trees and pluck roses 
by the wayside for loved ones at home. At our feet lie the 
ruins of the Roman Forum, the palaces of the Caesars, the 
Arch of Titus and the Coliseum. Ruins everywhere, and 
we think, What is the value of the work of man! He rears 
palaces, temples and monuments, he passes away and his 
works crumble to dust! Surely, if this world were all of 
life, how little it would be worth living! But we thank 
God that we can look beyond the ruins and ravages of time 
to a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 

THE COLISEUM. 

The wonderful structure, grand, massive and imposing 
in its ruins, was built by the emperors Vespasian and Titus 
after the destruction of Jerusalem, some twelve thousand 
Jews who were brought as captives from Palestine by Titus 
assisting in building the gigantic structure. It is one thou- 
sand, six hundred and forty-one feet in circumference, two 
hundred and eighty-seven feet long, one hundred and 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



33 



eighty-two feet wide and one hundred and fifty-seven feet 
to the top of its lofty walls. It was built of stone and 
brick and covered with marble. Seats were arranged in 
tiers in the interior so that from all parts of the great struct- 
ure each of the one hundred thousand people who could 
find sitting and standing room could see all that transpired 
in the arena below. 

It was completed in the year A. D. 80 and Titus dedi- 
cated it with games and gladiatorial contests. It is said 
that five thousand wild beasts were slain and as many men 
were killed in the contests, which were continued for one 
hundred days. Thus the great amphitheatre was dedicated 
in blood, and it was not many years until, around these 
old ruins, thousands of Christians were cruelly tortured and 
torn by wild beasts. 

It is in ruins now, but so strong was it built that the 
lower wall is entire around the whole building and more 
than a fourth of it stands as it was completed. We walk 
among the ruins and stand in the arena, we see the dens 
where the wild beasts were kept and our mind goes back to 
the ages past. We see the great building filled to its ut- 
most capacity. The games have been played, the contests 
settled, and now a little band of men and women are led in- 
to the arena; they have been brought from prison and stand 
alone and unarmed in the amphitheatre. They stand, the 
center of the great, gazing throng, and in all that throng 
there is not a pitying eye. The cry goes around the great 
building, "The Christians to the lions, to the lions!" On 
the faces of the little band who stand alone is a peace that 
passeth understanding. An old, gray-haired father says: 
44 Let us pray." They kneel reverently in prayer, while the 
multitudes shout and upbraid them. At a given signal the 
dens are opened. The famished lions, kept without food 



34 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and maddened with the smell of blood, spring into the are- 
na. For an instant they stand dazed by the light, shaking 
their shaggy manes, then they spring upon their victims. 
The band of Christian martyrs is torn to pieces and the 
savage Romans yell themselves hoarse with delight. Such 
a scene as this comes before us to-day in the arena of the 
Coliseum, and it is not a picture of the imagination,' for 
thousands of Christians were torn to pieces in Rome by 
wild beasts. We turn to our traveling companion and say, 
Let us thank God that we live in an age when such scenes 
are impossible. Yes, the old amphitheatre is in ruins and 
we are glad of it. A writer, who once visited the place, 
said of the Coliseum: 

" Its solitude, its awful beauty and its utter desolation, 
strikes upon the stranger, the next moment, like a softened 
sorrow; and never in his life, perhaps, will he be so moved 
and overcome by any sight, not immediately connected 
with his own affections and afflictions. To see it crumbling 
there, an inch a year; its walls and arches overgrown with 
green, its corridors open to the day; the long grass in its 
porches; young trees of yesterday springing up on its rag- 
ged parapets, and bearing fruit: chance produce of the 
seeds dropped there by the birds who build their nests 
within its chinks and crannies; to see its pit of fight filled 
up with earth, and the peaceful cross planted in the center; 
to climb into its upper halls and look down on ruin, ruin, 
ruin, all about it; the triumphal arches of Constantine, Sep- 
timus Severus, and Titus, the Roman Forum, the Palace of 
the Caesars, the temples of the old religion, fallen down and 
gone; is to see the ghost of old Rome, wicked, wonderful 
old city, haunting the very ground on which its people 
trod. It is the most impressive, the most stately, the most 
solemn, grand, majestic, mournful sight conceivable. Nev- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 35 

er, in its bloodiest prime, can the sight of the gigantic Coli- 
seum, full and running over with the lustiest life, have 
moved one heart as it must move all who look upon it now, 
a ruin. God be thanked, a ruin!" 

The first Christian martyr who suffered in this place 
was Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, the disciple of John and 
the companion of Polycarp. When brought into the arena 
he knelt down and exclaimed: " Romans, who are present, 
know that I have not been brought into this place for any 
crime, but in order that by this means I may merit the frui- 
tion of the glory of God, for love of whom I have been 
made prisoner. I am as the grain of the field, and must be 
ground by the teeth of lions, that I may become bread fit 
for his table." Then closing his eyes in silent prayer he so 
remained until the famished lions were loosed and he was 
torn to pieces and devoured. Jamieson, in his "Sacred 
Art," referring to the martyrdom of this servant of God, 
says: " His story and fate are so well attested, and so sub- 
limely affecting, that it has always been to me a cause of 
surprise as well as regret, to find so few representations of 
him." 

Soon after the death of Ignatius one hundred and fif- 
teen Christians were shot to death in the arena with arrows, 
and from this time on, until the end of the pagan persecu- 
tion, A. D. 315, the history of the place is replete with the 
sufferings of the Christian martyrs. 

We repeat again, we are glad the Coliseum is a ruin. 
Yes, thank God, a ruin! 

THE CATACOMBS. 

Long before we came to the City of Rome, we had 
heard about and read of the great Catacombs. They may 
be said to encircle the ancient city; for you may go out of 



jU WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Rome on almost any of the fourteen great consular roads 
that radiate from the golden milestone in the Roman Fo- 
rum, and at a distance of two or three miles from the walls 
of the city you will find entrances to these subterranean 
galleries. To us they are especially interesting, as they are 
directly connected with the early history of the Christian 
religion. 

But they are not an object of interest to modern trav- 
elers only. In the early centuries of the Christian era they 
excited as much interest as they do now. Then they were 
entirely lost sight of for many centuries. The entrances 
were blocked up, and even their existence became un- 
known. In the seventeenth century they were discovered, 
and since then every visitor to Rome sees with interest 
these ancient galleries. 

The Catacombs are first referred to by Jerome, one of 
the church fathers who wrote A. D. 380. He says: "When 
I was a boy, being educated at Rome, I and my school- 
fellows used on Sunday to make the circuit of the sepul- 
chres of the apostles and martyrs. Often we descended in- 
to the crypts, which are excavated deep into the earth, and 
contain as you enter, on either hand in the walls, the graves 
of the dead; and they are even in all parts dark, so that the 
language of the prophet seems to be fulfilled: ' Let them 
go down quick into Hades.' Only occasionally is light let 
in to mitigate the horror of the gloom; and then not so 
much through a window as through a hole. When we 
again advance, the surroundings are made as dark as night; 
as Virgil says, 

' A nameless horror makes the region drear, 
The very silence fills the soul with fear.' " 

Prudentius, the Christian poet who lived and wrote 
near the close of the fourth century, thus describes the 
Catacombs: 



Interior of the Catacombs, showing Sleeping-places of the Dead. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



39 



"In nowise far from the cultured border in advance of the fortified 
bounds, 

Lies a dark crypt sunk in gaping caves. 

Into this a descending way leads by hidden steps; the sunbeams, 
Concealed by reason of the turnings, are shut out in daytime. 
For the dawning light enters the cavity to the door at farthest, 
And lightens as far as the threshold of the vestibule. 
From thence, gently proceeding, the vista is blackness, 
The loculi are obscured in darkness, from the uncertainty of the pas- 
sages. 

There occur apertures, thrust in the roof above, 
Which throw a clear gray ray into the cave. 
Although from that place, the mazes weave in and out 
About narrow galleries and dark courts, 
But yet, down below the hollow bowels of the hill, 
Often the light penetrates the pierced vaulting. 
Thus the absent sun distinguishes the subterranean, 
His brightness and shining yields advantage." 

The truthfulness of these descriptions will at once be 
recognized by all those who have gone down into the black 
darkness and gloom of these underground vaults. But it 
does not describe them sufficiently for those who have not 
seen them. Having gone down into them with lighted wax 
tapers and a trusty guide, and explored some of the dark 
and intricate passages and galleries, one of the " sleeping 
places" of the dead of the primitive church of Rome, we 
propose to give our readers some account of these vast, 
subterranean cemeteries. In the preparation of this sketch 
we take pleasure in acknowledging our indebtedness to Dr. 
Russell Forbes, an eminent authority on the antiquities of 
Rome, who accompanied us in our walks through the dark 
passages, and gave interesting explanations as we passed 
along. 

First, then, what are the Catacombs? The name which 
is modern does not convey any idea as to the use of these 
underground galleries. Originally they were called coeme- 
teria, a Latin word meaning "sleeping places," from which 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

we have our word cemetery. It will be remembered that 
the apostles always refer to death as a sleep. Paul speaks 
of five hundred brethren who saw the Lord, "The greater 
part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep;" 
and again, "Them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring 
with him;" and, "We which are alive and remain unto the 
coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are 
asleep." Peter also speaks of the fathers as having fallen 
asleep. How natural then, with the views they had of 
death and the resurrection, that the Christians should call 
their tombs sleeping-places! And how expressive of their 
hope of, and faith in, the raising of the body! The Lord 
had said of Lazarus, " He sleepeth." So, when death called 
away one of the early Christians, they said, " He is not 
dead, but has fallen asleep; when the Lord comes again, he 
will call him from his sleeping-place." 

When Paul came to Rome it was the almost universal 
custom of the Romans to burn the bodies of their dead 
friends. The ashes were then carefully collected and 
placed in funerary urns which were deposited in vaults pre- 
pared for that purpose. The very idea of burning their 
dead was, with the views they held, repugnant to the Chris- 
tians. As the body of their Lord had been wound in fine 
linen and laid in a rock-cut tomb, so it was the desire of 
those who accepted his teachings to be laid away in like 
manner when they had fallen asleep. This idea culminat- 
ed in what are now known as the Catacombs. They are 
simply a series of rock-cut tombs, and were the sleeping- 
places of those who died in the Lord. 

According to the Roman law, frequently re-enacted 
during the days of the empire, the burial of the dead, or 
even their ashes, was strictly forbidden within the walls of 
the city. These laws were, of course, just as binding on 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 41 

the Christians as they were on the Romans. Hence the 
burial-places are found from one to three miles from the 
outer wall of the city. Thus, when Julius Caesar was assas- 
sinated and divine honors were accorded him, it required a 
special act of the Roman Senate to burn his body and bury 
the ashes in the Forum. 

Another law, made in accordance with the faith of the 
Roman people, held all burial-places as sacred. It was 
made a capital offense to desecrate a cemetery or disturb 
the ashes or the body of the dead. This law explains why 
the Christians were permitted to excavate tombs for their 
dead, undisturbed even in times of the most bitter persecu- 
tion. They even became places of concealment for the 
Christians, and often, in these underground passages, the 
persecuted church at Rome met to celebrate the Lord's 
Supper and partake of the communion. Here, surrounded 
by their sainted dead, the persecuted Christians celebrated 
the agape, feast of love, and as they were seated around the 
tables they vowed to be true to each other, sealing their 
vows with the right hand of fellowship and the holy kiss of 
peace and charity. 

Of these underground meetings Lindsay says: " But all 
this while there was living beneath the visible and invisible 
Rome a population unheeded, unreckoned, thought of 
vaguely, vaguely spoken of, and with the .familiarity and 
indifference that men feel who live on a volcano, yet a pop- 
ulation strong-hearted, of quick impulses, nerved alike to 
suffer and die, and in number, resolution, and physical force 
sufficient to have hurled their oppressors from the throne 
of the world, had they not deemed it their duty to kiss the 
rod, to love their enemies, to bless those that cursed them, 
and to submit, for their Redeemer's sake, to the powers that 
be! Here, in these dens and caves of the earth, they lived; 



4 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

here they died— a 'spectacle' in their lifetime 4 to men and 
angels,' and in their death a 'triumph' to mankind— a tri- 
umph of which the echoes still float around the walls of 
Rome, and over the desolate Campagna, while those that 
once thrilled the Capitol are silenced, and the wails that re- 
turned them have long since crumbled into the dust." 




Entrance to one of the Catacombs. 



But let us examine more minutely these vast subterra- 
nean abodes of the dead. Going out of the City of Rome 
on almost any of the great consular roads a distance of 
from one to three miles we find the entrances to the Cata- 
combs. We go down by an artificial, modern stairway to a 
depth of twenty or twenty-five feet and find ourselves in a 
dark, narrow gallery. This is the entranceway to the un- 
derground sleeping-places of the dead. They consist of 
long, narrow galleries, from two and one-half to three feet 
wide (and in some places even narrower), and seven or 
eight feet high, cut in the solid rock, from fifteen to fifty 
feet below the surface of the earth. The galleries are cut 
with great regularity, so that the floor and roof are at right 
angles with the sides. They run in straight lines, but are 




A Gallery in one of the Catacombs, 



44 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

crossed by others, and then by others again, until a perfect 
network of galleries is formed in a labyrinth where one 
might wander in the very blackness of darkness, and never 
find his way out. 

The galleries are cut on different levels, so that there 
are in some places as many as five series of these corridors 
lying below each other. In the one we visited to-day we 
found five levels, each reached by a descending stairway 
cut in the rocks. The walls on either side of the galleries 
are honeycombed with graves cut in the rock, one above 
the other. Into these openings, just high and wide enough 
to admit the body, the dead were laid, and the opening was 
then closed with a marble slab or terra cotta tiles. No cof- 
fins were used in the first centuries in burying the dead. 
The body was wrapped in linen, with some aromatic spices 
and herbs, and laid in the sepulchre hewn out of the rock. 
Thus the early Christians in Rome buried their dead after 
the example of the burial of their blessed Lord and Master. 
On the marble slab which closed the grave, the name was 
usually engraved with the words " hi peace" or, " He sleeps 
in peace." The older inscriptions are all in Greek, while the 
later are in Latin. In some cases, in addition to the name, 
other words and sentiments were engraved on the marble. 
We give a few of these inscriptions, translated by Dr. 
Forbes: 

" Nicephorus, a sweet soul in refreshment." 

" Regina, mayest thou live in the Lord Jesus." 

"Valeria sleeps in peace." 

"Loticus laid here to sleep." 

"Sweet Faustina, may you live in God." 

"Agape, thou shalt live forever." 

"The place of Basil, the Presbyter, and his wife Felici- 

tas," 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



45 



" Diogenes the fossor buried in peace on the eighth 
before the calends of October." 

" Lannus Christ's martyr rests here. Made under Dio- 
cleti." 

" Lawrence to his sweetest son Severus, the well de- 
serving, borne away by the angels on the seventh before 
the ides of January." 

" Primitus in peace. After many torments, a most val- 
iant martyr. He lived thirty-eight years. His wife raised 
this to her dearest husband, the well deserving." 

" Here lies Gordius, deputy of Gaul, who was executed 
for the faith, with all his family. They rest in peace. 
Theophila, a handmaid, set this up." 

" She died at the age of thirty-five. From the day of 
her baptism she had lived fifty-seven days." 

"Petronia, a deacon's wife, the type of modesty. In 
this place I lay my bones. Spare your tears, dear husband 
and daughters, and believe that it is forbidden to weep for 
one who lives in God. Buried in peace on the third before 
the nones of October in the consulate of Festus." 

"I commend to thee, O Basilla, the innocence of Ge- 
mellus. To Paul a well-deserving son, who lived two years 
and fifty days. May the spirits of all the saints receive 
thee into peace." 

" Centianus, a believer, in peace, who lived thirty-one 
years, eight months, sixteen days. Also in your prayers 
pray for us, for we know that you are in Christ." 

The translations might be extended almost indefinite- 
ly, but these will suffice to give a general idea of what is 
found in the Catacombs in the way of inscriptions. 

The early Christians in burying their dead in rock-cut 
tombs were only following the Bible examples. Abraham 
bought the cave of Machpelah " for a possession of a bury- 
ing place," and he " buried Sarah his wife in the cave of 
the field of Machpelah." "Then Abraham gave up the 



^5 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

ghost and died . . . and his sons Isaac and Ishmael 
buried him in the cave of Machpelah."* Isaac and Re- 
becca and Jacob and Leah were also buried there. Laza- 
rus was buried in a cave, or rather, a rock-hewn tomb: " It 
was a cave, and a stone lay upon it."f And most impor- 
tant of all to the early disciples, Christ was laid in a tomb 
hewn out of the living rock. "And when Joseph had 
taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and 
laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the 
rock."* It was quite natural, then, for the Christians to 
follow these examples in preparing resting-places for the 
bodies of their dead. 




Side View of an Ancient Sarcophagus with Sculptured Figures in Bas-relief. 



There are about sixty of the Catacombs within a radius 
of three miles from the Roman Forum. According to De 
Rossi's careful calculation they cover an area of six hun- 

*Gen.25: 8, 9. 
tJohn n: 38. 
|Matt. 27: 60. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



47 



dred and fifteen acres. It must not be forgotten that the 
galleries run one above another so that in some places as 
many as five are thus disposed. It may be said that the 
Catacombs are five stories high. The deepest level reached 
is about fifty feet below the surface, and this is nearly on 
the water level of the Tiber. Had they dug deeper the 
passages would have been filled with water. If all the un- 
derground passages, rooms, galleries, and corridors were 
placed in a straight line their total length would be nearly 
seven hundred miles. If stretched between Chicago and 
Philadelphia, they would almost reach from the City of the 
Lakes to the City of Brotherly Love. 

The rock into which the Catacombs were cut is a stra- 
tum of tufa much softer than limestone. The men who ex- 
cavated the tombs were known as fossores or gravediggers 
and they performed their labors with pickaxe, hammer and 
chisel. There is no evidence that any kind of explosives 
was used in excavating the subterranean passages. These 
men spent most of their time in hewing out the tombs and 
at last were laid away, as the inscriptions show, in the nich- 
es which they had made. 

Another feature of these great burial vaults has not yet 
been referred to. At some places the galleries are enlarged 
into square, and at others into circular rooms of consider- 
able size. These were family burial-places and here, about 
the beginning of the fourth century, stone coffins were first 
used. The rooms were cut out for those who were able to 
pay for the work, and were doubtless used, as were the first 
stone coffins, called sarcophagi, by the wealthy. 

In one of the largest of the rooms which we visited, 
fifty people might find standing-room at one time. In it is 
the following inscription, clearly cut in a large slab of mar- 
ble. It was erected by Damasus, Bishop of the church of 
Rome, A. D. 366: 



Crypt in the Catacombs, showing Skeletons in the Niches. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



49 



" Here, if you would know, lie heaped together a num- 
ber of the holy." 

"These honored sepulchres enclose the bodies of the 

saints. 

"Their lofty souls the palace of heaven has received." 

" Here lie the companions of Christ, who bear away 
the trophies from the enemy." 

"Here a tribe of elders, which guard the throne of 
Christ." 

" Here is buried the priest who long lived in peace." 

"Here the holy ministers who came from Greece." 

" Here lie youths and boys, old men and their chaste 
descendants, who kept their virginity undefined." 

" Here I, Damasus, wished to have laid my limbs, but 
feared to disturb the holy ashes of the saints." 

The good bishop, not finding space for a sepulchre 
among the martyrs of the early church, caused a tomb to 
be built for himself at the entrance to the 
catacomb in which this inscription is to be 
seen, and there he was laid to rest, and his 
tomb remains unto this day. 

Another interesting feature of the Cata- 
combs is that they contain the earliest at- 
tempts of the Christians in decorating the 
tombs of the dead in painting or frescoing. 
In the larger rooms, many of which were 
covered with plaster, rude pictures, painted 
very early in the Christian era, are to be 
seen. As might be expected, the scenes 
are all taken from the Bible. That most 
frequently met with is a representation of 
Christ as the Good Shepherd. The figure is 
that of a man with a lamb on his shoulders. 
In the baptism of Christ by John in the Jordan the Savior 
is represented as having stepped down into the water, while 




The Good Shepherd, 
Fresco hi the 
Catacombs. 




^0 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

John is probably in the act. The Lord's Supper, the agape 
of the early church, is also painted on the walls of the 
tombs. Moses striking the rock, and the story of Jonah 
are also illustrated. In the latter is seen a great sea 
monster, and not a whale, casting Jonah upon dry ground. 
This shows that the revised version is correct in rendering 
it sea monster instead of whale. 

The frescoes are but rude- 
ly executed, and yet they 
teach their own lessons. No 
one would come to the Cata- 
combs to take lessons in the- 

RePresentation of Loaves and Fish in Q logy, and yet they prove be- 

the CatacombS - yond all doubt that the prim- 

itive church believed that Christ was baptized in the river, 
and not on its bank, and that the agape, or love feast, was 
practiced in the primitive church. 

The frescoes to which we have referred belong to the 
very earliest period. Later improvement was made in 
drawing and painting, and in the catacomb we explored we 
saw the head of our Lord painted on the wall, which 
showed skill and artistic taste. To this subject we have 
given considerable study, and in a succeeding letter we will 
o-ive the latest and most authentic developments on the 
question as to whether there is a correct portrait of our 
Savior in existence. 

We have merely glanced at the Catacombs and what 
they contain, and already the limits of our space have been 
exceeded. We might spend months here and write vol- 
umes without exhausting the different subjects. We are 
confining our work to Christian Antiquities, and our next 
letter will contain a study of the footsteps of Paul in Rome. 



CHAPTER III. 



— % — 

Paul ill Italy and Rome —Puteoli— Appii Forum and the Three Tav- 
erns. — The Appian Way. 

"And from thence, when the brethren heard of us, they came to meet us as far as 
Appii Forum, and the Three Taverns; whom when Paul saw, he thanked God, and took 
courage."— Acts 28: 1$. 




* WTO HIS ninth day of December, 1892, God, in his infi- 
^Ops? nite goodness and mercy, has permitted us to trav- 
VS> r erse the Appian Way, over which his servant Paul 
walked when he was brought a prisoner to Rome. We 
went out as far as the fourteenth milestone, counting from 
the center of Rome. Just beyond the eleventh milestQne 
we came to the Three Taverns, where the brethren met 
Paul and gave him encouragement. And here by the way- 
side we write these lines, not very far from the place where 
Paul rested, " thanked God and took courage." 

From the Three Taverns the Appian Way ascends the 
mountain to Albana. To the edge of this village we walk 
and stand on the ridge of the hill from which, as he came 
from Appii Forum, Paul caught his first sight of Rome, 
where he was afterwards to suffer a martyr's death. And 
what a grand sight it is! Although fourteen miles away, 
Rome is in plain sight. The dome of St. Peter's Cathedral 
glistens in the rays of the noonday sun. What a different 
sight met the eyes of Paul as he stood here more than 
eighteen hundred years ago and looked upon pagan Rome! 
He came along this road a prisoner, bound with a chain. 
In some places the same blocks of stone over which he 
51 



* WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

5 2 

walked, worn away by the chariot wheels that passed over 
them two thousand years ago, are still to be seen. And 
there is not the least doubt that this is the road by which 
Paul entered Rome. 

Retracing our steps we return to the Three Taverns. 
There are three buildings here to-day and it is likely that 
there was the same number in Paul's time— an inn, a shop 
where the broken chariots might be mended, and a dwell- 
ing-house. Dr. Forbes in his researches has removed all 
doubt as to the place, and we are writing to-day at one of 
the places where the brethren met Paul and gave him new 
courage to continue in the great work of preaching the 
Gospel of the Son of God to the Gentiles. 

Let us follow Paul from the place where he landed in 
Italy till he reached the City of Rome. But we defer this 
until after we visit the place where he landed. In our re- 
searches we are not willing to take hearsay evidence when 
we can see the places we wish to describe. 

PUTEOLI. 

" And after one day the south wind blew, and we came 
the next day to Puteoli: where we found brethren, and were 
desired to tarry with them seven days; and so went toward 
Rome." To-day we stood on a part of the old, ruined pier 
at Pozzuoli, the Italian name for Puteoli. On the founda- 
tions of the old pier has been built a new structure, but 
there is still part of the old to be seen rising above the wa- 
ter, on which Paul landed on his journey to Rome. Al- 
ready the Christian religion had spread along the shores of 
the Great Sea and reached the port of Puteoli. And when 
Paul landed in the spring of A. D. 62 at this place, the 
brethren met him and his company and prevailed upon 
them to spend a week with them. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



53 



It had been a long, dangerous, and toilsome voyage. 
They had sailed from Cesarea in the fall of A. D. 61. 
Touching at Sidon, they sailed by Cyprus to Myra of Lyc- 
ia. Here they changed ships, and, contrary to Paul's 
counsel, left port and were shipwrecked on the Island of 
Malta (Melita). Here they spent the winter and now they 
had reached the last stage of their journey by ship. After 
having passed through the great perils of the deep by ship- 




Puteoli, Paul's Landing-place in Italy. 



wreck, and their long winter sojourn with the barbarous 
people of the Island of Melita, how it must have rejoiced 
the hearts of Paul and his company to be received and 
warmly greeted by the brethren at Puteoli. No doubt they 
were easily persuaded " to tarry with them seven days," 
and Paul would comfort and confirm the brethren in their 
faith. 



. , WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

54 

How soon that week must have passed away! We 
should like to linger here at Puteoli, but our space will not 
allow an extended description of Paul's landing-place in 
Italy, and so we go with him toward Rome. The journey 
is a long and tedious one, over mountains and valleys. 
The distance to be traveled on foot is one hundred and sev- 
enty miles. The little company of believers start out on 
the great Consular road ( Via Consularis), and follow it to 
its junction with the Appian Road ( Via Appia), "the queen 
of long roads," as it was called by the Romans. Here they 
stop for a short rest at Capua, one hundred and fifty miles 
from Rome. Continuing their journey along the Appian 
road they cross the Pontine Marshes and at last reach Ap- 
pii Forum, where the first company of brethren met them, 
forty-three miles from the Imperial City. 

Here we notice the regard these brethren had for the 
prisoner who was coming to them. They went out a long 
distance to meet him, and how their solicitude must have 
cheered the hearts of the weary travelers. After resting at 
Appii Forum, the journey was continued to the Three Tav- 
erns, the last halting-place before reaching Rome, and elev- 
en miles from the city. And here another and, doubtless, 
a larger company of the brethren met the prisoner, " whom 
when Paul saw, he thanked God and took courage." 

Here we have an account of two companies of the 
. brethren meeting Paul. Those who went to Appii Forum 
were, perhaps, able to spend more time than those who 
came to the Three Taverns. The latter were, doubtless, 
laborers. They could quit their work at 3 o'clock in the 
afternoon, go out to the place of meeting, and return again 
in the early morning in time to begin their day's labor. 
This may account for the two companies of brethren who 
went out from Rome to meet Paul and his fellow-travelers. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 55 

From the Three Taverns to the city the Appian Way 
was literally lined on either side with magnificent tombs, 
costly monuments, great temples and beautiful villas. The 




Arch of Drusus through which Paul passed when he entered Rome. 

ruins are to be seen to this day and are of much interest to 
the traveler. With a largely-increased company the last 



^ WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

stage of the apostle's journey begins in the early morning, 
so that the city may be reached before the heat of the day; 
and, in all probability, before 9 o'clock Paul passes beneath 
the Arch of Drusus, enters the Capena Gate, is taken 
through the city by the Palatine Hill, on which stood the 
Palace of the Caesars, and across the Roman Forum to the 
Camp of the Praetorian Guard. " And when we came to 
Rome the centurion delivered the prisoners to the captain 
of the guard: but Paul was suffered to dwell by himself 
with a soldier that kept him." 

Thus ended Paul's long journey. And with him it end- 
ed as it began. He was still a prisoner. It is true, he was 
not cast into prison. Being a Roman citizen that could not 
lawfully be done without a trial. Yet, while he was al- 
lowed some degree of liberty and freedom, so that he could 
rent a house and dwell by himself, he was still in bondage. 
A soldier was constantly with him and "kept him," and it 
is not at all improbable that he was chained to a Roman 
soldier the greater part of the time. 



PAUL IN ROME. 



One of the first things the apostle did, after having se- 
cured a house and settled his household affairs, was to 
make an effort to call the Jews who lived in Rome to 
Christ He called the chief of the Jews together and gave 
them some account of himself, telling them that for the 
hope of Israel he was bound with a chain. Then they ap- 
pointed a day when they would hear him concerning Jesus, 
and he preached to them with all the zeal and power of 
which he was capable. This showed that his heart's desire 
was that Israel should be saved; but when they rejected the 
Truth he turned to the Gentiles. 

As to Paul's life in Rome we know but little. Ihe 
concluding words of the last chapter of the Acts of the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 57 

Apostles tell us that he " dwelt two whole years in his own 
hired house, and received all that came in unto him, preach- 
ing the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which 
concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man 
forbidding him." We know, too, that God overruled Paul's 
bondage and chains for good, and that it resulted in the or- 
ganization of a strong church in Rome. So great was the 
apostle's influence that even some of the members of Cae- 
sar's household were converted to the faith. We know, 
too, that his life for these two years was active and full of 
work; not only did he preach the Gospel, but the care of 
other churches was upon him. Of his labor in Rome he 
speaks, in writing to the Philippians: "Now I would have 
you know, brethren, that the things which happened unto 
me have fallen out rather unto the progress of the gospel; 
so that my bonds became manifest in Christ throughout 
the whole praetorian guard, and to all the rest." Here, too, 
he wrote the epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippi- 
ans, Colossians, Second Timothy and Hebrews. 

Chrysostom, writing of Paul and his relations to the 
church at Rome, says: " I honor Rome for this reason; for 
though I could celebrate her praises on many accounts, — 
for her greatness, for her beauty, for her power, for her 
wealth, and for her warlike exploits, yet passing over all 
these things I glorify her on this account, that Paul, in his 
lifetime, wrote to the Romans, and loved them, and was 
present with, and conversed with them, and ended his life 
amongst them. Wherefore, the city is, on this account, re- 
nowned more than all others. On this account I admire 
her, not on account of her gold, her columns, or her other 
splendid decorations." 

Another author, writing of the labors of the apostle, 
says: " Paul had already accomplished much in the conver- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

sion of sinners. At Cyprus the Roman officer, Sergius 
Pauhis, had been converted. At Athens he had preached 
to the court of the Areopagites, and Dionysius, one of that 
learned body of judges, had accepted the Truth. And now 
at Rome he was doing valiant work for the Master. His 
words are heard even in the Golden House of Nero. Not 
only those who attend the court but some of the household 
of Caesar, possibly some of his relatives, yield to the power 
of the ambassador of Jesus Christ. Then he also gathered 
a group of eager disciples about him. There was Onesiph- 
orus, of Ephesus, who was not ashamed of Paul's chain, 
Epaphros, of Colosse, who was captive with him, Timothy, 
his own son in the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ, with 
Hermas, Aristarchus, Marcus, Demas, and Luke, the well- 
beloved physician, the faithful companion and friend of the 
apostle." These stood by him and comforted him. How 
blessed is the man who has helpful, loving friends in time 
of need-friends not of a day, a month, or a year, but 
friends for life and death! Such were Paul's friends, and 
surely he was richly blessed of God. 

On the Palatine Hill stood Caesar's judgment hall. We 
walked amid its ruins and thought of Paul standing there 
alone before Nero, the blood-stained adulterer, who was to 
judge him and pass upon the charges preferred against him 
by the Jewish Sanhedrim He was fully prepared for his 
trial, and anxious for the time to come. He wrote at this 
time': " According to my earnest expectation and my hope, 
that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all bold- 
ness as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my 
body, whether it be by life, or by death. For to me to live 
is Christ, and to die is gain." He was ready to go before 
Caesar, but while he was waiting, on May 18, A. D. 64, a 
great fire broke out in the City of Rome, and raged with 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



59 



great fury for six days. It is generally agreed that the city 
was burned by the order of Nero himself, and to escape 
suspicion he threw the blame on the Christians. The re- 
sult was a bloody persecution in which many were put to 
death. We quote the account given by Tacitus of this per- 
secution. 




Nero and Poppcea his Wife. 

" Hence, to suppress the rumor, he, Nero, falsely 
charged with the guilt, and punished with the most exqui- 
site tortures, the persons commonly called Christians, who 
were hated for their enormities (being mixed up by the 
Romans with the Jews, who, at this time, were in revolt). 
Christus, the founder of that name, was put to death as a 
criminal by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea, in the reign 
of Tiberius; but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a 
time, broke out again, not only throughout Judea, where 
the mischief originated, but through the City of Rome also. 
Accordingly, first those were seized who confessed they 
were Christians; next, on their information, a vast multi- 
tude were convicted, not so much on the charge of burning 
the City, as of hating the human race. And in their deaths 
they were also made the subjects of sport, for they were 



5q WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

covered with the skins of wild animals and worried to death 
by dogs, or nailed to crosses, or set fire to, and when day 
declined, burned to serve for nocturnal lights. Nero of- 
fered his own gardens for that spectacle, and exhibited a 
circensian game, indiscriminately mingling with the com- 
mon people in the habit of a charioteer, or else standing in 
his own chariot; whence a feeling of compassion arose 
towards the sufferers, thought guilty and deserving to be 
made examples of by capital punishment, because they 
seemed not to be cut off for the public good, but victims to 
the ferocity of one man." ("Annals of Tacitus" 15, 44.) 

Before the persecution started the great apostle had 
some hopes of being released and set at liberty. He wait- 
ed patiently for his trial. Writing to the Philippians at 
this time he says of Timotheus, 44 Him therefore I hope to 
send presently, so soon as I shall see how it will go with 
me. But I trust in the Lord that I also myself shall come 
shortly." Philpp. 2: 23, 24. In the same hopeful frame of 
mind he writes to Philemon: " But withal prepare me also a 
lodging: for I trust that through your prayers I shall be 
given unto you." Phil. 22. In his first trial at Cesarea he 
stood alone: "At my first answer no man stood with me, 
but all men forsook me: I pray God that it may not be laid 
to their charge." 2 Tim. 4: 16. Now the brethren of 
Rome were with him and comforted him: " Eubulus, Pu- 
dens, Linus, Claudia and all the brethren." But while he 
is hopeful, he is also fully prepared for the issues of the tri- 
al. Whether it be to live or to die, to depart or to remain, 
he is ready for the issue. He can say with calmness and 
in the full assurance of faith: 44 Christ shall be magnified in 
my body, whether it be by life, or by death. For to me to 
live is Christ, and to die is gain." Philpp. 1: 20, 21. 

But now all is changed. While Paul waits the emper- 
or sets the city on fire and, as we have seen, throws the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



61 



blame and odium on the Christians. The terrible persecu- 
tion is begun. Paul, the well-known leader of the sect 
called Nazarenes, is placed under close surveillance and the 
time for his trial is fixed. The persecution rages. Men, 
women and children are tortured and put to death in the 
most cruel and heartless manner. The day for the trial of 
the apostle is at hand, and he knows that the day of his tri- 
umph has come. Writing for the last time to his beloved 
son Timothy he exclaims in prophetic language: " For I 
am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure 
is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my 
course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for 
me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous 
judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but 
unto all them also that love his appearing." 2 Tim. 4: 6-8. 
Grand and fitting words with which to close life's labors. 
How these words have cheered and comforted weary Chris- 
tians all the centuries since Paul wrote them; and they will 
continue to be a comfort until the Master shall come 
again. 

The end of the apostle's suffering and bonds is now at 
hand. He is taken to Caesar's judgment hall and stands be- 
fore the bloody tyrant who is guilty of every crime known 
in the catalogue of gross human sins. What a contrast! 
Paul, the aged prisoner of Jesus Christ, whose life had been 
spent in the service of his Master; Nero, the sensuous vo- 
luptuary, the human monster whose very name causes men 
to shudder even to-day. We have no account of the trial. 
We know that he was innocent, but he was condemned to 
death. Under the Roman law no time was allowed be- 
tween sentence and execution. As Christ was led from Pi- 
late's judgment hall to the place of crucifixion, so Paul was 
taken from before Caesar to the circus on the Vatican Hill, 
and there this valiant soldier of the cross was put to death. 




52 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

In the center of the Circus stood a silent witness to the 
sufferings and death of Paul and his followers -an Egyp- 
tian obelisk brought from the quarries at Assuan by the 
Emperor Caligula. It had been hewn 
out by Pharaoh's workmen, but had 
never been erected in Egypt. In 
1586 it was removed from the Circus 
and placed in front of St. Peter's 
Church in Rome. Standing by this 
solemn, silent witness of the death of 
Paul the mind is carried back to the 

sufferings of this heroic servant of circus / jvero, from a Coin. 
God. It bears the inscription: "Christ 

is triumphant! Christ reigns! Christ is emperor! Christ 
paid all our debts." 

Reference has been made to the fact that when Paul 
went to Rome it was the custom among the Romans to 
burn the bodies of the dead. The ashes were put in vases 

and these were deposited in 
underground vaults, espe- 
cially prepared for that pur- 
pose and called columba- 
ria. Like the Catacombs, 
the columbaria were cut in 
rock. In the galleries on 
either side niches were cut 
and in these were placed 
the cinerary urns or vases 
containing the ashes of the 
dead. Beneath these were 
placed marble slabs containing inscriptions relating to 
those whose ashes rested here, 




Portrait of Paul painted on a Glass V %se 
of the Fifth Century. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



65 



We visited the columbaria of Scipio and of the serv- 
ants of Caesar's household. The latter contain the ashes 
of the officers and members of the imperial family from 
Caesar to Nero inclusive. It is interesting because it is in 
an excellent state of preservation and because some of the 
names found in it are mentioned in the New Testament. 
The following are the inscriptions: 

" Tryphena Valeria and Valerius." 

" Futianus to the memory of the mother Tryphena." 

" Varia Tryphosa, patron, and M. Eppius Clemens erect- 
ed this to his well-beloved wife who lived thirty years." 

M Ampliatus made this for his well-deserving brother 
Restitutus." 

The names of Onesimus, Philetus and Epaphras also 
occur in the inscriptions. 





An Inscription in the Catacombs. 



Paul in his letter to the Romans, written at Corinth 
A. D. 68, refers to Tryphena and Tryphosa. He says: " Sa- 
lute Tryphena and Tryphosa, who labor in the Lord." 



5^ wanderings in bible lands. 

Rom. 16: 12. To Philemon he says: " I beseech thee for 
my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds." 
Phil. 10. Ampliatus is spoken of in the letter to the Ro- 
mans and Epaphras in the letter to the Colossians as " our 
dear fellow servant" and "one of you, a servant of Christ," 
and to Philemon as " my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus." 

The inscriptions compared with the writings of the 
apostle show that the names used are the same. The ques- 
tion at once arises, Are they the same? Can we to-day 
look upon the ashes of those early Christians in Rome? 
The answer by Dr. Forbes is given. Speaking of these 
names he says: "They are uncommon and we have them 
mentioned only by Paul and on these marble slabs, which 
slabs are in the columbaria of the freedmen of the Caesars, 
agreeing in date with the time of Paul's letters, who him- 
self preached to and had converts among the household of 
Caesar, in the Praetorian Camp, and in the imperial palace 
upon the Palatine Hill. He says, writing to the Philippi- 
ans (chapter 1 : 13): 'So that my bonds in Christ are mani- 
fest in all the palace, and in all other places;' and in chap- 
ter 4: 22, 'All the saints sah te you, chiefly they that are of 
Caesar's household.' " 

The name of Valeria was taken by Tryphena when she 
obtained her freedom from her mistress, the Empress Mes- 
salina, whose name was Valeria. The slabs were erected by 
their fellow-servants in the official household of Caesar, and 
show in what esteem these men and women who had em- 
braced Christianity were held by their associates, and there 
seems to be no doubt that the names inscribed on the mar- 
ble slabs in the columbarium are likewise named by Paul. 



CHAPTER IV. 



The Arch of Titus.— The Golden Candlestick and Table of Show- 
bread— St. Peters Cathedral —The Bronze Statue— St. Paul's 
Church— The Portrait of our Lord. 



k N one occasion the disciples called the attention of 




our Lord to the great buildings of the temple at 
Jerusalem; and as they stood beholding the won- 
derful structure, he said to them: "See ye not all these 
things? Verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here 
one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down." 
After this he sat on the Mount of Olives, with the Holy 
City spread out before him, and, calling his disciples to 
him, gave them that wonderful prophecy concerning the 
destruction of Jerusalem, recorded by Matthew, which was 
so literally fulfilled forty-one -rears later. 

When Christ spoke the words of this prophecy to his 
disciples the reign of Tiberius was drawing to a close. He 
was succeeded by Caligula, who reigned four years and 
gave place to Claudius, who was succeeded by the tyrant 
Nero (54-68) under whose reign occurred the first persecu- 
tion in Rome, in which Paul, and, it is supposed, Peter also 
suffered martyrdom. The immediate successors of Nero 
were Galba, Otho and Vitellius, each reigning but a few 
months. A change then occurred in the reigning family. 
Vitellius was the last of the Julian family, as the immediate 
successors of Julius Caesar were called. He was succeeded 
by a soldier named Vespasian, and it was during his reign 
67 



68 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



(A. D. 69-79) that his son Titus marched against Jerusa- 
lem and, after a long siege, took and completely destroyed 
the City of David. Thus it will be seen that, from the 
time our Savior foretold the destruction of Jerusalem until 
all his words concerning that event were fulfilled, seven 
different emperors ruled in Rome. We refer to this to 
show what great changes had taken place in the Imperial 
City. 

After the destruction of Jerusalem the Roman Senate 
conferred upon Titus divine honors and accorded him 
a triumphal entry into the City of Rome. It was a grand 
display in honor of the conqueror. At the head of the 
procession rode the victorious general, followed by his vet- 
eran soldiers. Then came the captives, — men, women and 
children, — who were to be sold into a slavery worse than 
death. No doubt among that band of prisoners who 
marched through Rome that day were some who had 
heard of the prophecy of Christ and had seen him cruci- 
fied. Now, too late, they realized what they had done. 
Following the captive Jews came the spoils of war. And 
here was to be seen the furniture of Solomon's Temple— 
the golden candlestick, the table of showbread and the Ark 
of the Covenant— all carried on the shoulders of captive 
Jews. It must have been an imposing spectacle. 

After this the Senate decreed that a triumphal arch 
should be erected to commemorate the destruction of Jeru- 
salem and the victory of Titus. This was built in A. D. 81, 
and in this structure we have a silent witness to the truth 
of the Bible. To-day the arch is standing across the tri- 
umphal way. It is finely embellished with statuary in re- 
lief. One figure represents Titus crowned by victory. But 
the most interesting part of the work is a representation of 
the triumphal procession with the captive Jews, the victors 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



71 



carrying the golden candlestick with seven branches and 
the table with the showbread. The work was finely 
wrought in marble, and the carved candlestick agrees 
exactly with the description given in the Bible. It shows 
that the artist had the candlestick before him when he did 
the work. The features of the men are also of the well- 
known Jewish type. Here is indisputable evidence that 
Titus destroyed Jerusalem, that he carried the Jews into 
captivity and that he brought the holy vessels and the 
furniture of the temple to Rome. 

We made a careful and critical examination of this 
relic of the past, and to us it seems a wonderful witness cl 
the truth of God's Book. As we stood beneath the lofty 
arch, we thought of Hawthorne's words, " Standing be- 
neath the Arch of Titus, and amid so much dust, it is diffi- 
cult to forbear the commonplaces of enthusiasm, on which 
hundreds of tourists have already insisted. Over the half- 
worn pavement, and beneath this arch, the Roman armies 
had trodden in their outward march, to fight the battles, 
a world's width away. Returning victorious, with royal 
captives and inestimable spoil, a Roman triumph, that most 
gorgeous pageant of earthly pride, has streamed and flaunt- 
ed in hundredfold succession over these same flagstones, 
and through this yet stalwart archway." 

CHURCHES AND CATHEDRALS. 

Rome is a city of churches. There are hundreds of 
them, ranging in splendor from St. Peter's Cathedral down 
to the modest wayside chapel. We have space here to re- 
fer briefly to only two of them, — St. Peter's within the 
gates, and St. Paul's a mile from the city wall. Anything 
like a full description of either of these wonderful build- 
ings would require a volume instead of the space we can 
give here. 



;i WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

St. Peter's Cathedral stands near the place where Paul 
was beheaded and is on the supposed site of Peter's cruci- 
fixion. The first church was built here by Constantine the 
Great. The present structure dates from the year 1450 
when the reconstruction of the old church was begun by 
Nicholas V; it was dedicated Nov. 18, 1626. Additions 
were made to it, so that, at the beginning of the present 
century, the total cost of construction and decorations 
amounted to over fifty million dollars. An addition to the 
church by Pius VI, cost nearly one million dollars and the 
annual cost of its maintenance and repairs is three hundred 
and seventy-five thousand dollars. 

The following measurements are given as being ap- 
proximately correct. Total length of building, including 
the portico, is six hundred and ninety-six feet; the greatest 
width in the transept, four hundred and fifty feet; the 
height of the ceiling in the central nave, one hundred and 
fifty feet, and from the pavement to the summit of the 
dome, four hundred and thirty-five feet. The area inside 
of the walls is eighteen thousand square yards, nearly 
double that of the next largest cathedral in the world. 
The immense size of the building makes it the most impos- 
ing, and, at the same time, the most expensive church 
in the world. A calculation as to the number of people 
who might find standing room in the church shows that, by 
placing three upon each square yard, fifty-four thousand 
persons might be crowded into the immense structure. 

The interiors of many of the great cathedrals of 
Europe are dark, damp and gloomy. This, is true of St. 
Paul's in London, Notre Dame in Paris, and the Cologne 
Cathedral. To this St. Peter's is a notable exception. It 
is flooded with light. As you enter the building the light 
falls on the many-colored, polished marble floor and is re- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 73 

fleeted on rich walls, on columns of variegated marble, 
agate and porphyry, lighting up the richly-coffered, gild- 
ed ceiling with dazzling effect. The first impression is one 
of bewilderment, but as the eye gradually takes in the vast 
proportions and the beauty of the interior, and the mind 
grasps the plan which Michael Angelo, the architect, 
wroueht out, the beholder is filled with wonder and amaze- 
ment by the harmony and symmetry of its proportions and 
the wondrous beauty of the building. The great dome 
rests on four huge columns, each two hundred and thirty- 
four feet in circumference, and yet so well are these pro- 
portioned that they seem light and airy in the huge 
structure. 

Beneath the dome, in the center of the church, is an 
imposing bronze canopy, ninety-five feet in height, under 
which is the high altar. It is said to stand immediately 
over the tomb of the Apostle Peter. Around it are eighty- 
nine lamps, kept constantly burning. Here the Pope of 
Rome alone officiates on occasions of high church festivals. 
At such times the great building is crowded to its utmost 
capacity. Here once each year he washes, wipes and kiss- 
es the feet of twelve of his cardinals, selected for that pur- 
pose. This is done in imitation of the washing of the dis- 
ciples' feet by the Master. We could not but reflect upon 
the contrast between the two scenes. 

At Jerusalem in an upper chamber, borrowed or hired 
for the occasion, Jesus with the twelve sat down to eat his 
last supper with those he loved. It was a humble little 
group, poor in this world's goods but rich above all in 
heavenly possessions. He rose from supper and washed 
their feet. The Son of God had not where to lay his head. 
The Pope of Rome officiates in a fifty million dollar 
church. And here, amid all this splendor, robed in rich 



^ WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

vestments, sparkling with the costliest gems, he follows the 
example of Christ and washes his cardinals' feet. Could 
there be a greater or a more striking contrast? 

One thing more about the cathedral and we leave it 
Near the high altar is a bronze statue, said to represent 
Peter The figure is in a sitting posture and is placed on a 
marble throne. The right foot is slightly extended, or 
rather what is left of it, for it is partly worn away. Every 
faithful Catholic who passed by as we stood looking at the 
statue pressed his lips against the bronze foot, wiping it be- 
fore and after kissing it. Some, after kissing, placed the 
forehead against the foot and offered a prayer. Much kiss- 
in- and wiping have worn away the hard bronze, until the 
toes are nearly all gone. Surely, this is zeal without 
knowledge! 

st. Paul's cathedral. 
We "ive this splendid church a mere passing notice. 
One writer has said that the finest monument ever erected 
in this world is the church at Rome to the memory of Paul 
the apostle to the Gentiles. The edifice is one vast hall of 
fine marble and mosaics, and has been reared by contribu- 
tions from nearly all parts of the world. The interior « 
grand and imposing and is nicely decorated with different 
colored marble. The ceiling is richly coffered and is sup- 
ported by eighty immense granite columns, beautifully 
polished. 

•• Imperial splendor all the roof adorns; 
Whose vaults a monarch built to God, and graced 
With golden hues the vast circumference. 
With gold the beams he covered, that within^ 
The light might emulate the beams of morn." 

In this church is to be seen in mosaics a head of Christ 
after the description of Isaiah, "He hath no form nor 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 75 

comeliness; and when we shall see him there is no beauty 
that we should desire him." The artist succeeded in mak- 
ing a face without a single line of beauty in it. 

After visiting these magnificent structures we have 
many reflections. Two thoughts were especially impressed 
upon the mind. 

1. Here are millions upon millions of dollars spent in 
extravagant display, and within easy distance of St. Peter's, 
thousands, of people are suffering for the necessaries of life. 
At the doorways of these costly structures every visitor 
is beset by beggars who depend upon the generosity of 
strangers for bread. There seems to be something radical- 
ly wrong with a system that produces such striking con- 
trasts in the lives of its followers. Splendor, magnificence, 
lavish display, untold extravagance within: beggary, hun- 
ger, starvation without. 

2. If the piety of a people, and the correctness of 
their beliefs were to be measured by the amount of money 
they give, then these must stand very high, for see the fab- 
ulous sums spent here in the construction of these great 
churches. We have referred to two, and there are hun- 
dreds of them. It is true that piety and faith can not be 
measured in that way, but the zeal of the Roman Catholic 
church can be. And they put to shame many who give so 
sparingly to the church of their choice. We profess, as a 
people, to follow the Master in all his teachings, and we 
believe we are right. Let us show our zeal and earnest- 
ness, not in building stately and magnificent churches but 
in spreading the Gospel and in keeping the poor. A man, 
rich in this world's goods, can only be saved from degrada- 
tion and ruin by a liberal benevolence. 



7 6 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



THE PORTRAIT OF OUR LORD. 

The accompanying portrait of our Savior is from a 
photograph purchased in Cologne, Germany, several years 
ago. The face has about it a wondrous beauty. The fol- 
lowing words are printed beneath the portrait: " Das einzige 
richtige Portrait unseres Heila?ides Jesu Christi" On the 
back of the card is printed in German a sketch of the 
painting from which the photograph was taken. Translat- 
ed it reads as follows: 

"THE ONLY TRUE PORTRAIT OF OUR SAVIOR. 

"The picture on the other side is the copy of a cut in 
emerald, which was made at the order of the Emperor Ti- 
berius and kept in the treasury at Constantinople. Later 
on, the original was used by the Emperor of the Turks as a 
ransom for his brother who had at the time, under Pope In- 
nocent V, been captured by the christians. The faithful- 
ness of the picture is shown through Publius Lentulus, at 
that time governor of Judea, in whose writings to the 
senate and the Roman people a passage is found of which 
the following is a translation: 

"'There has appeared in these days a very virtuous 
man, Jesus Christ by name, who is still living among us and 
is looked upon as a prophet by the heathens, but by his 
own disciples he is called Son of God. He raises people 
from the dead and heals all kinds of disease. A man of 
somewhat tall and imposing stature and of very venerable 
appearance, so that those who see him are led both to fear 
and to love him. His hair has the color of a fully ripened 
hazelnut, almost smooth down to the ears; from there on 
it is somewhat curled, flowing over his shoulders, and of 
more nearly oriental color; after the manner of the Naza- 
renes it is parted in the middle. His forehead is free and 
smooth, his face without spots or wrinkles, beautiful, of a 
pleasing red. Nose and mouth have a form with which no 




Portrait of our Savior. 



WANDERIN3S IN BIBLE LANDS. 79 

fault can be found. The beard is full, its color matching 
well with that of the hair, not very long. His eyes are 
gray, clear and full of life; his body is well formed and 
firmly built, his hands and arms in good proportion. In 
censure he is terrible, in admonition kind and fascinating, 
in his speech temperate, wise and modest, joined with 
dignity. No one can recall that he has seen him laugh, but 
many have seen him weep.' 

" A man surpassing the children of men in his singular 
beauty." 

The traveler in Europe will find, in many of the shops 
where pictures are sold, numerous so-called portraits of our 
Savior. In price they range from a few pennies for the 
cheaper lithographs to large sums of money for the beau- 
tiful copies, in oil colors, of the masterpieces of Guido, 
Michael Angelo and Raphael. It is said that Raphael's 
head of Christ in the great transfiguration scene has never 
been equaled. The face has a glorified beauty about it that 
is marvelous. At a very early date the artists made many 
attempts to depict the features of the Savior and the result 
is an immense number of portraits. 

The question, Is there an authentic portrait of our 
Lord in existence? is of more than common interest. The 
Roman Catholic church claims that there is; but this claim 
is not well founded, and many of the portraits purporting 
to represent the face of our Savior are nothing more than 
pious frauds. While in the Imperial City we had an excel- 
lent opportunity to carefully examine the subject. We saw 
and secured a number of the so-called portraits, and one 
needs only to compare them, and see the difference be- 
tween them, to come to the conclusion that, to say the very 
least, it is not at all likely that there is a true representa- 
tion of the head of our Savior in existence. 



g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

We were also fortunate, during our stay in Rome, to 
receive some* very valuable information on this subject 
from Dr. Forbes, and we propose to give to our readers the 
benefit of the researches made by him on this subject. 
The information here given may be considered as entirely 
reliable, and is well worth a careful study. It is the result 
or a long, careful, painstaking investigation of the entire 
question: 

" It may seem strange to many that none of the Lord's 
disciples describe his appearance, although there are pre- 
tended descriptive portraits of him, written at a later date. 
Isaiah foretells his appearance, and his are the only refer- 
ences in the Sacred Scriptures that tell us what the Son 
of Man was like personally. ' His visage was so marred 
more than any man, and his form more than the sons of 
men.' 52:14. 'He hath no form nor comeliness; and 
when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should 
desire him.' 53: 2. 

44 This was exactly the way in which the early Byzan- 
tine artists portrayed Christ, as for example in the fifth 
century mosaic on the arch of triumph in the church of St. 
Paul without the walls. 

" Lampridius, in his life of Alexander Severus, speaks 
of that emperor having a bust of Christ in the chapel of his 
household gods. This proves that portraits of our Savior, 
either true or ideal, were existing in the third century. 
St. John Damascenus, in the eighth century, speaks of a 
portrait that Constantine had done from a supposed ' de- 
scription of Christ, written to the Roman Senate by Publi- 
cs Lentulus, proconsul of judea before Herod.' We have 
failed to trace any such proconsul, but it is the oldest de- 
scription of the Lord extant, most probably late in the sec- 
ond century when all sorts of apocryphal writings were cir- 
culated: 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



" 4 At this time appeared a man who is still living and 
endowed with mighty power; his name is Jesus Christ. 
His disciples call him the Son of God; others regard him 
as a powerful prophet. He raises the dead to life and 
heals the sick of every description of infirmity and disease. 
This man is of lofty stature and well proportioned; his 
countenance, severe and virtuous, so that he inspires be- 
holders with feelings both of fear and love. The hair of 
his head is of the color of wine, and from the top of the 
head to the ears, straight and without radiance, but it de- 
scends from the ears to the shoulders in shining curls. 
From the shoulders the hair flows down the back, divided 
into two portions, after the manner of the Nazarenes; his 
forehead is clear and without wrinkle, his face free from 
blemish, and slightly tinged with red, his physiognomy 
noble and gracious. The nose and mouth faultless, his 
beard is abundant, the same color as the hair and 
forked. His eyes blue and very brilliant. In reproving or 
censuring, he is awe-inspiring; in exhorting and teaching, 
his speech is gentle and caressing. His countenance is 
marvelous in seriousness and grace. He has never once 
been seen to laugh; but many have seen him weep. He is 
slender in person, has hands straight and long, his arms 
beautiful. Grave and solemn in his discourse, his language 
is simple and quiet. He is, in appearance, the most beauti- 
ful of the children of men.' — Codex Apocryphus Nov. Test, 
ab Fabriciutn, 1703.pt. 1, page 301. 

"In the Apocryphal New Testament there are epistles 
supposed to have been written by Jesus and Abgarus, King 
of Edessa. They are quoted by Eusebius, and John Da- 
mascenus adds that 4 Abgarus charged his messenger to 
employ some artist to make a portrait of our Lord Jesus, 
from whom nothing is hidden, and to whom nothing is im- 
possible. Being aware of the intention of Abgarus he took 
a piece of linen, applied it to his face, and depicted there- 
on his own image. This very portrait is in existence at the 



32 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



present day, and in perfect preservation.' We remember 
photographs of this pretended portrait being sold in Lon- 
don some years ago. It was said to be preserved in the 
church of Silvestro in Capite, Rome, till 1870 when it was 
removed to the Vatican. In S. Prassede is a miniature on 
a texture, but the features are obliterated; it shows a figure 
in outline down to the waist. This is also claimed to have 
been sent by Christ to Abgarus. This naturally reminds us 
of the story of St. Veronica, who is said to have wiped the 
Savior's face on his way to Golgotha, and that the impres- 
sion of his features remained on her handkerchief. This is 
displayed on grand occasions at St. Peter's, and facsimiles 
can be bought in the Roman shops. We may also consider 
as of the second century the rare bronze medal upon which 
the Lord's profile is engraved. This medallion was ex- 
hibited in Rome, in the time of Pope Julius II, and has 
been discussed by various writers in the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries, though its story is comparatively lit- 
tle known now. It will be found engraved and described 
in the Rev. R. Walsh's essay on ancient coins, 1828, he hav- 
ing bought it of a Jew at Rostock. In 1700 one was dug up 
at the ancient circus of Brin-gwin in Wales, and sent by 
Rowland to Luid, at the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, 
but it was lost in transit. Another was found in 1812 at 
Friarswalk, in Cork. The style of this medallion shows 
that it can not be later than the age of the Antonines, say 
A. D. 180; it was not a piece of money, but a talisman to be 
worn as a charm. One impression, in the possession of 
Mrs. T. W. Vessey, Bristol, has a hole in it, so that it could 
be suspended round the neck. 

"The reverse of the medal has written, in Hebrew 
characters, in five lines, 'The Messiah has reigned, he came 
in peace, and, being made the Light of man, he lives,' On 
the obverse is the head of our Lord in profile,, to the left, 
as described by Lentulus. On the left field is written, in 
Hebrew, Jesus, and on the right, the letter aleph, the ini- 



WANDERINGS 



IN BIBLE LANDS. 



83 



tial of Adonar, Lord. The portrait on this medallion has 
become received in western art as the type likeness of 
Christ, the Byzantine artists making their heads of Jesus 
more round, of which there are many specimens in the mo- 
saics of Rome. We are rather inclined to think that the 
letter of Lentulus and the medallion are of the same origin, 
and made to fit one another. The Christians of the first 
and early part of the second century certainly had no por- 
traits of Christ, the Jewish influence and the second com- 
mandment would prohibit that. 

" We now come back to the first century, to the days of 
the Messiah, to inquire if any portrait of our Lord was 
made in his lifetime; and if so, if any trace of it is existing. 
We think it improbable that any of the apostles should 
have painted the features of Jesus, and those paintings, at- 
tributed to St. Luke, are pious frauds. Of all these, and 
there are many, that at the Scala Sancta is said to have 
been done by St. Luke in outline, and that invisible hands 
filled in the coloring during his absence from the studio. 
It is a late Byzantine portrait, a pear-shaped head with 
beard and mustache. Wood-cuts and photographs of it are 
sold at the Scala Sancta. 

" Eusebius, bishop of Cesarea, in the days of Constan- 
tine, speaks of having seen 1 representations of the Apos- 
tles Peter and Paul, and of Christ himself, still preserved in 
paintings.' He also speaks of a statue of Jesus at Cesarea 
Philippi, as follows: 'They say that the woman who had an 
issue of blood, mentioned by the evangelists, and who ob- 
tained deliverance from her affliction by our Savior, was a 
native of this place, and that her house is shown in the 
city, and the wonderful monuments of our Savior's benefit 
to her are still remaining. At the gates of her house, on 
an elevated stone, stands a bronze image of a woman on 
her bended knee, with her hands stretched out before her 
like one entreating. Opposite to this there is another 
bronze statue of a man, erect, decently clad in a mantle 



84 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and stretching out his hand to the woman. Before her 
feet, and on the same pedestal, there is a certain strange 
plant growing, which, rising as high as the hem of the 
brazen garment, is a kind of antidote to all kinds of diseas- 
es. This statue, they say, is a statue of Jesus Christ, and it 
has remained even until our times; so that we ourselves saw 
it whilst tarrying in that city.' (Eusebius E. H. VII, 18.) 
Sozomen also speaks of it and says, 'Julian commanded it 
to be taken down, and a statue of himself to be erected in 
its place; but fire from heaven was poured down upon Ju- 
lian's statue, and the head and breast were broken, and it 
was thrown to the ground with the face downwards; it is 
still to be seen on the spot where it fell, blackened by the 
effects of the lightning. The statue of Christ was dragged 
round the city and mutilated by the Pagans; but the Chris- 
tians recovered the fragments and deposited the statue in 
the church in which it is still preserved.' (E. H. V., 21.) 

« There is nothing unreasonable in believing that the 
woman did erect the group which Eusebius says he saw, 
and we may presume that the artist would make the Lord's 
likeness as the woman described it. It has not been exist- 
ing for very many years, for Sozomen speaks of its destruc- 
tion, but a marble relief of the fourth century, depicting 
the scene at Cesarea, exists in the Lateran Christian Muse- 
um. On the left at the top of the hall of Sarcophagi is one 
under a canopy; at one end of it is the scene of Peter deny- 
ing Christ, with buildings in the background; and at the 
other end is the woman and our Lord, also with buildings 
in the background, as described above by Eusebius. One 
of these is evidently the woman's house, a church and bap- 
tistry is also shown, evidently the scene at Cesarea. We 
believe the group in relief to be a copy of the bronze one 
at Cesarea, and so this would represent the oldest portrait 
of our Lord; and it agrees with the bronze medallion de- 
scribed above. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



3 5 



" The figures of our Lord in the early sculpture work 
invariably depict him as a young man, as for example in 
the scene with Peter at the other end of the above cited 
sarcophagus, but the figure in the relief with the woman is 
of the received type as described by Lentulus. We consid- 
er that the relief and medal hand down to us, perhaps 
roughly, the features of Jesus Christ. The heads of Christ 
in the catacombs are not earlier than the ninth century, and 
they follow the type at St. Paul's with an attempt to beau- 
tify it in accordance with the decree of Adrian I, 772-95, 
that 'Christ should be represented under as beautiful a 
form as art could display.' " 

From the foregoing it will be seen that we are fully 
justified in the conclusion that there is no authentic por- 
trait of our Lord in existence. Some of the older portraits, 
made after the description by Lentulus, may, in a general 
way, give us some of his features, but as a rule the later 
paintings are largely drawn from the imagination of the ar- 
tists themselves. 

At this writing, Dec. 16, we are in the City of Naples. 
In a few days we take the Steamer Rosetta for Port Said, 
Egypt. From there we go to Suez, and to the route of the 
Exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt. Then, 
crossing over the Land of Goshen, we go to Cairo, hoping 
to reach the latter place on Christmas Day. We are both 
enjoying excellent health. The Lord has abundantly 
blessed us, and we give him thanks and praise. 



CHAPTER V. 

\r 



From Rome to Naples —Mount Vesuvius— An Eruption. 

JSBSrqm Rome we journey by rail to Naples, a distance 
X^T^ of some two hundred miles. After leaving the Im- 
^N© perial City the road crosses the Tiber and passes 
the ruins of the old aqueduct and the tombs along the Ap- 
pian Way. After crossing the Campagna we pass through 
a rough, hilly country, given up almost entirely to the cul- 
tivation of the vine, and finally reach Naples, the largest 
city in Italy, with a population of about half a million. 
The city is built around about the bay of the same name, 
and has always been noted for the beauty of its situation. 

The chief attractions of the place are Mount Vesuvius, 
Pompeii and Herculaneum, all within easy distance of the 
city. The peculiar customs of the place are very striking 
and interesting to the traveler. Our first walk through the 
city was in the early morning. We noticed flocks of goats 
being driven about the streets and found that many fami- 
lies receive their supply of milk from these animals. They 
are driven from door to door and up the stairways to the 
upper stories of the houses where they are milked while the 
customer stands by and waits for his supply of the rich, 
lacteal fluid. 

Cows are also driven about the streets and milked at 
the doors of those who buy the milk. There are two ad- 
vantages in this system: it does away with milk wagons, 

86 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



87 



and the people of Naples, it would seem, are sure that they 
get pure milk without the addition of chalk and water, 
which, it is said, are sometimes served to customers in our 
large cities at home. But appearances are deceptive. The 
milkmen of Naples carry water in rubber bags secreted un- 
der the folds of their coats. A small tube passing down 
beneath the sleeve of the garment is so manipulated that a 
quantity of water is allowed to run into the can while the 
process of milking is going on. Some of the customers, 
aware of the tricks of the milkmen, do the milking them- 
selves, and thus get pure milk. 

Mount Vesuvius, one of the most noted volcanoes in 
the world, rises in isolated majesty near the Bay of Naples. 
It is something over four thousand feet from the sea level 
to the top of its cone, in the center of which is the great 
crater. In ancient times, according to Strabo, Vesuvius 
"was covered with beautiful meadows, with the exception 
of the summit. The latter is, indeed, for the most part lev- 
el, but quite sterile; for it has an appearance like ashes, and 
shows rugged rocks of sooty consistency and color, as if 
they had been consumed by fire." During the reign of Ne- 
ro, A. D. 63, a fearful earthquake occurred, and sixteen 
years later, in the reign of Titus, nine years after the de- 
struction of Jerusalem, the great volcanic eruption oc- 
curred, which overwhelmed all the cities in the plain and 
converted the beautiful meadows into sterile wastes of ash- 
es and lava. Since then the mountain has been an active 
volcano. The greatest eruption in recent times occurred in 
April, 1872. The lava burst forth on every side, running 
down the mountain in a molten stream. A number of per- 
sons were overtaken and destroyed by the liquid stream of 
fire. A writer who witnessed the eruption says: "At the 
same time, amidst terrific thundering, the crater poured 



gg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

forth huge volumes of smoke, mingled with red-hot stones 
and lava, to a height of four thousand feet; whilst clouds of 
ashes, rising to double that height, were carried by the 
wind as far as Cosenza, a distance of one hundred and forty 
miles. The lava emitted during this eruption covers an 
area of two square miles, and averages thirteen feet in 
depth." 

The distance from Naples to the foot of the great cone 
is fifteen and one-half miles, and from this point a wire 
rope railway conveys the traveler upward nine hundred 
yards to the foot of the upper cone. From the upper sta- 
tion we climbed along a well-constructed path to the rim 
of the crater. We made two attempts to reach the top of 
the mountain and succeeded in getting a good view of 
the crater on Dec. 15. Soon after leaving the upper sta- 
tion, we noticed light wreaths of smoke issuing from the 
crevices along our upward pathway. A rumbling noise, re- 
sembling distant thunder, was heard at regular intervals 
and we had an indistinct feeling that the mountain quaked. 
Our guide said, " He," meaning the volcano, "working; but 
he no dangare." As we continued our upward course the 
smoke increased and the strong fumes of sulphur emitted 
were decidedly unpleasant. At one place a hole in the 
rock was emitting smoke in puffs. We put our hand in but 
removed it at once; it was quite hot. 

At this point the explosions, which occur at regular in- 
tervals in the crater, could be very distinctly heard and the 
tremor of the mountain felt. Still higher the smoke and 
sulphur grew thicker, and we were compelled to cover 
mouth and nose with handkerchiefs. At last we reached 
the rim of the crater, and looking down, we beheld a fear- 
ful sight. We thought of the bottomless pit. As we stood 
looking into the awful abyss, there came a terrific explo- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 89 

sion. The mountain shook, great masses of stone and lava 
were thrown high into the air and fell back again into the 
restless crater. Great tongues of bright-red flames burst 
through the dense volumes of smoke that rolled upward 
from the pit. The scene was a frightful one and our curi- 
osity to see a volcano at work was fully gratified in a very 
short time. The guide continued to assure us there was no 
41 dangare," but we went away to a point of greater security, 
where we watched the explosions for some time. 

One of the lessons here impressed was our own little- 
ness and helplessness. What wonderful powers God has 
stored away in the forces of nature! Man, standing in the 
presence of the manifestation of this mighty power, is less 
than a worm of the dust. Behold the Lord toucheth " the 
mountains, and they shall smoke. He looketh on the 
earth, and it trembleth: he toucheth the hills, and they 
smoke." The smoking mountain and the trembling earth 
seen and felt this day shall never be forgotten. Well may 
man say, " Lord, make me to know mine end, and the meas- 
ure of my days, what it is; that I may know how frail I 
am." 

POMPEII. 

On the twenty-fourth day of August, A. D. 79, the resi- 
dents of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and the other cities and 
villages located in the vicinity of Vesuvius, were startled 
by a terrific eruption of the mountain. A great column of 
smoke and ashes rose high in the air and spread out in the 
shape of a dense black cloud; the light of the sun was to- 
tally obscured, and in a short time a dense shower of ash- * 
es fell upon the doomed cities. When the eruption ended, 
Pompeii was covered with ashes and small stone to a depth 
of twenty feet. Some of the inhabitants fled at the first 
alarm and escaped. Others remained to remove their val- 



g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

uables and perished. It is estimated that at least two thou- 
sand perished in the ruins of their homes. Years rolled 
into centuries and the name and site of the city passed from 
the memory of man. More than sixteen hundred years 
went by and the city was rediscovered, and at this time 
about one-half of the buried city has been uncovered. The 
work of excavation is carried on by the Italian Govern- 
ment, and it is estimated that at the present rate of progress 
it will be sixty years before the entire city is excavated. 

When the city was buried it was full of life and activ- 
ity, and in the excavation many things are found as they 
were left on that terrible day in August. We walked 
through the streets of the excavated city, which are paved 
with blocks of stone. In many places deep ruts are worn 
into the pavements, showing that the Pompeiians drove 
through their streets with chariots and carts. The houses 
and shops are, in many places, remarkably well preserved. 
Here is a baker's shop. The ovens are still preserved and 
in one of them eighty-one loaves of bread were found, on 
some of which the baker's name was stamped. The loaves 
are still well preserved, and we see the bread that was 
placed in the oven A. D. 79 and taken out only a few years 
ago. Connected with the baker's shop are mills for grind- 
ing grain, and in them was found grain of various kinds, 
left there when the slaves who turned the mills fled for a 
place of safety. 

The articles found are placed in a large building for 
safe keeping, and here they may be examined and studied. 
Here one can form a good idea of the home life of the 
Pompeiians, as almost everything used in domestic life can 
be seen: articles of food, all kinds of grain, fruit, such as 
figs, dates, etc., oil, well preserved in glass bottles, the re- 
mains of household furniture, iron money chests, in shape 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



93 



resembling the modern iron safe, tools of various kinds and 
shapes, fishing-hooks, just the same as we use to-day, sur- 
gical instruments, and ornaments of all kinds, such as jew- 
els, bracelets, rings and chains, in great abundance. 

Among the many interesting objects to be seen at 
Pompeii, none are more wonderful than the plaster casts of 
objects found in the ashes which enveloped and covered up 
the city. These consist of human bodies, the bodies of an- 
imals, and other perishable objects. The following expla- 
nation will give our readers an idea as to how the casts of 
the various objects found are obtained. 

The first layer of matter that fell upou the city was 
fine ashes, and it completely covered up the lower part of 
the houses. It was so fine that it permeated every crack 
and crevice. It was finer than ordinary domestic dust, and 
enveloped the substances completely. Rolfe says,* It will 
be readily understood that it made an equal pressure all 
around them, and that they were consequently as com- 
pletely surrounded as if they had been immersed in water. 

The substances and objects thus covered made an ex- 
act mould of their forms in the ashes, which hardened a 
short time after their fall. Thus the form was most accu- 
rately preserved. An object buried in a snow-drift makes 
an exact mould in the snow. This gives an accurate idea 
of the process by which the moulds of objects were formed 
in the ashes that covered up Pompeii. 

Our readers will readily understand that all that was 
perishable in the substances buried crumbled to dust in the 
lapse of centuries. That is to say, the clothes and flesh of 
the victims, the woodwork of the doors and the willow of 
the baskets have all completely vanished; but the parts 



*We give an abridged account of the process found in Rolfe's excellent work on 
Pompeii. 



q4 wanderings in bible lands. 

less liable to decay remain, such as the iron and the bronze 
work of the doors and the bones and ornaments of the hu- 
man subjects. These all remained exactly as they were 
then covered, and held their original places in an accurate 
mould which the falling ashes made around them. We 
think this will be understood by our readers. 

The next process is more simple. When the excava- 
tors come to one of these moulds, which is made apparent 
in the rise of the layer of ashes, a slight opening is made 
into the cavity and liquid plaster of Paris is poured in and 
allowed to remain undisturbed until it thoroughly hardens. 
The external mould of ashes is then removed and an exact 
cast of the object is thus obtained, all that was perishable 
being now replaced by the plaster of Paris, and all that did 
not decay being firmly fixed in the plaster, and in its orig- 
inal place. 

In this way the exact form and even the features of 
men and women who perished here eighteen hundred years 
ago are as well preserved as if they had been cut in imper- 
ishable marble. In some of the faces, and in the positions 
of the bodies, is to be seen the evidence of intense suffer- 
ing. We might devote this entire letter to these interest- 
ing objects, but refer to only a few of them. 

The first is the form of a Roman soldier, found at one 
of the gates of the city, where he was standing on guard 
when the eruption came, and, instead of fleeing, fell at his 
post, true to the instincts of the Romans. This incident is 
often referred to as an example of faithfulness and fidelity. 

Another is that of a slave, evidently an African. The 
nose and lips clearly indicate the negro type, and the im- 
print of the curly hair is plainly to be seen. The folds of 
his clothing show with remarkable clearness. The right 
hand is firmly clasped and the expression of the mouth and 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. gj 

face shows intense agony. The left hand grasps his belt 
and the lower limbs are extended. 

The form of a dog, that was found tied to his kennel, is 
remarkably well preserved. The poor animal was tied, but 
had trodden the falling ashes under his feet till the length 
of his chain prevented him from getting any further, when 
he died, on his back, in great agony. His mouth is open 
and his legs are extended. The form is perfect. 

Among other objects preserved in this way are a num- 
ber of doors of the houses, and here is the first example of 
a panel door known. From the fact that the center pieces 
form a cross it is believed that it came from the house of a 
Christian, for it is well known that, before the destruction 
of Pompeii, Christianity had found converts in Italy. Pu- 
teoli, where Paul landed, is only a few miles across the bay 
from the ruined city. If there were brethren at Paul's land- 
ing-place, it is only fair to assume that seventeen years lat- 
er there were brethren in Pompeii. The author of "The 
Last Days of Pompeii " takes this view, and we believe he 
is correct. 

THE MORALS OF THE PEOPLE. 

The brethren in Pompeii found a terrible state of af- 
fairs in the moral and social depravity of the people. In 
Paul's Epistle to the Romans is found a characterization of 
the people of that city, and the first chapter of that letter 
would have applied to the Pompeiians, even if it had been 
intensified twofold. The ruins of the city give silent yet 
unmistakable evidence of its vice and wickedness. Many 
of their practices were so vile, and their morality so low, 
that language cannot be used to express the depths of in- 
famy to which they had gone. Sodomy, and like vices, 
were among their sinful practices. Sodom was overthrown 



gg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

because of its wickedness, and Pompeii certainly deserved 
the same fate. The degradation of woman was complete, 
and, as a result, men were equally depraved and degraded, 
for the one follows the other as surely as like causes pro- 
duce like effects. As we walked through the streets of the 
excavated city and saw evidences of the utter depravity and 
wickedness of the people, we said to the Elder, " No won- 
der God destroyed this place." And, in some respects, it 
is a pity that after eighteen hundred years it should have 
been uncovered, yet it shows, beyond all doubt, that Paul's 
characterization of the immorality of the Romans is by 
no means overdrawn, and it thus becomes a terrible wit- 
ness of the truth of the apostle's words in the first chapter 
of his letter to the brethren in Rome. 

In traveling in the different countries of the world, the 
condition of the masses of the people always forms an item 
of special interest to us, and we are constantly drawing con- 
trasts between the conditions of the people in Europe and 
the East and those of our own favored land. The questions 
as to how the laboring class lives, what wages they receive, 
what is the condition of the poor, will, no doubt, be inter- 
esting and instructive to our readers. Last year, in our 
wanderings in northern Europe, we gave this subject con- 
siderable attention, and we now refer to the condition of 
the laboring classes in Italy. 

In all the cities of Italy the poverty that prevails is 
made apparent by the great crowd of beggars that meet us 
wherever we go. If we enter a church we are beset, both 
in going in and coming out, by an importunate crowd of 
poor unfortunates, who stand in groups about the doors, 
showing their deformities, hoping to excite sympathy and 
secure alms. If we walk out of any of the gates of the cit- 
ies, the same thing occurs, only the crowd of beggars is 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



99 



larger and more importunate. Giving does not satisfy. It 
only increases the demands made upon you by the begging 
throng of men and women, boys and girls. If we drive 
along the public highway, our carriage becomes the center 
of attack, and whether we drive slow or fast, the beggars 
are with us. They run by the'side of the carriage long dis- 
tances, imploring us for money. Half-grown girls, each 
carrying a baby brother or sister, will follow a carriage sev- 
eral hundred yards, keeping pace with the trotting horses. 
Giving by no means rids us of the nuisance. It only makes 
the matter worse. 

The following experience will illustrate the result of 
giving. Driving one day from Naples to Mt. Vesuvius, we 
passed through the poorer part of the city, lying on the 
slope of the mountain. We were making a steep ascent 
along a narrow street, and had to drive slow. As usual, we 
were beset with beggars, and we distributed a few pennies 
for sweet charity's sake. Immediately our carriage was lit- 
erally surrounded by beggars. Our simple act of giving 
seemed to have turned every boy and girl in the street into 
a beggar. They filled the air with their cries of " Signor! 
Signor! " If we threw pennies on the ground, hoping thus 
to rid ourselves of the nuisance, there was a rush and a 
struggle until the question of ownership was settled, then, 
with whetted appetite for more, they came on more clam- 
orous than ever. We simply had to endure the noise and 
make the best of it. After following us a mile or more, 
they grew tired and fell back. 

It is said that begging is the curse of Italy, and we are 
willing to give half assent to the statement. The beggar 
loses all self-respect and independence of character. Once 
a beggar, always a beggar, is the rule. Indiscriminate giv- 
ing is an evil, not only in Italy, but in our own land. It 



100 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



has made a race of beggars in Italy. It is encouraging a 
race of tramps at home, and the responsibility rests upon 
those who give with mistaken notions of charity. To give 
judiciously, to help the worthy poor, is a Christian duty, 
but it is equally a Christian duty not to give where giving 
will result in evil. 

The home life of the poor people here does not, it 
seems to us, have a single ray of light in it. They are de- 
prived of everything that makes life worth living to us. 
Poverty-stricken as they are, they live in the merest hovels, 
and filth too horrible to mention is found on all sides. It 
is among this class of people that the cholera finds its vic- 
tims by the hundreds. The bacilli, or cholera germs, de- 
light in filth, and here they revel in the very luxury of dirt, 
grow fat, and daily increase the death rate to an alarming 
extent. 

In Rome and in Naples we visited the homes of the 
poor people. We passed through the streets and went into 
some of the houses. In Naples the conditions seem to be 
worse than in Rome. Here the houses open on the street. 
Indeed, the women and children spend the winter days sit- 
ting on the sunny side of the street. Here they keep warm. 
Stoves are not known among them. Those who are able, 
build a fire in an iron pan and sit around it when it is cold. 
Women and children old enough to work are busy. Plait- 
ing straw, knitting and sewing are the principal occupa- 
tions. Inside the house, the floor of the single room is us- 
ually made of brick or flat stones. On one side stands the 
bed. If the family owns a donkey, he has his place in one 
corner of the room. The chickens, and there are usually 
one or two dozen in each house, go in and out of the door 
at will, roosting, in some cases, in the family room. As a 
rule no windows are seen, the door admitting the light. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 101 

Here, in the darkness and filth, men, women and chil- 
dren have what they call their homes. Here they ex- 
ist. They seem cheerful and contented with their lot, and 
that is the worst part of it. It is hard to improve the con- 
dition of a people who have settled down to a dull content- 
ment, born of a condition in which there is no hope of a 
better day. If it is true that happiness consists in the 
things we learn to do without, these people ought to be 
happy. They live on what many families waste in our 
country. But deprivation of the common necessaries of 
life is not the only evil among them. The ordinary propri- 
eties, nay, the common decencies of our home life, are en- 
tirely wanting. 

The condition of the small farmer and the country la- 
borer is not essentially better than that of the poorer class- 
es in the cities. He owns a small parcel of ground, from 
two to four acres. His home is devoid of comfort, and his 
life is one of toil. He, with his family, spends part of his 
time in farming their few acres. The ground is all turned 
over with a spade, men and women laboring together at 
this hard work. Of course plows are used on the larger 
farms. After his few acres are planted and sown, the farm- 
er seeks work wherever he can find it. The women and 
children plait straw and make baskets, thus eking out their 
scanty living. 

In many districts the very best farm laborer can secure 
only from forty to fifty dollars a year, and part of the time 
he must board himself out of this very small sum. Signor 
Bodo, an authority on Italian statistics, gives the average 
wages in summer, for a male adult, as two lire (forty 
cents) a day, and in winter, one lira and fifty centesimi 
(thirty cents) a day. He further remarks that account 



102 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

must be taken of the times when no work can be had. A 
fair average estimate for three hundred working days each 
year is fifteen cents a day. It must be remembered that 
this amount can be earned by only the best farm laborers. 
Some work for ten cents, and even less^ a day. At home 
our laborers would not be able to live on such wages, much 
less lay something aside each year, as we are glad to know 
many of them do. 

The condition of woman here is no improvement over 
that found in northern Europe, to which we referred at 
some length in our letters last year. She is found laboring 
in the fields, turning over the ground with the spade, work- 
ing side by side with men, and apparently doing as much 
work as the stronger sex, but receiving here, as in our own 
country, less wages for doing the same amount and same 
kind of work. When will men learn to deal justly with 
women? Why should a man receive more wages for doing 
a certain piece of work than a woman who does it equally 
well and often better? It is simply a piece of injustice that 
we, as men, all ought to be ashamed of. 

But we find women at work, not only in the fields, but 
in the stone-quarries, on the railway, on buildings, and, in 
fact, in every occupation, in which men engage. We saw 
women at work in the quarries, carrying heavy stones on 
their heads, moving them from place to place. We saw 
them carrying stones, in the same manner, to masons who 
were engaged in building a wall. We saw them removing 
earth from excavations, by putting it into baskets, then put- 
ting the baskets on their heads and carrying them away 
like beasts of burden. All this seems hard enough to look 
at, but when it is known that for this slavish work the high- 
est price paid to woman is ten cents a day, it seems almost 
incredible. To her it is a question of starvation, and she h 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



103 



willing to labor all the weary day for a mere pittance, 
which is certainly not enough to supply her with a suffi- 
cient quantity of good, wholesome food. After her hard 
day's work in the field or quarry, which, by the way, is not 
a day of ten hours, but " from early morn till dewy eve," 
she goes to her cheerless home, where poverty and want 
are constant guests, and where, if she have strength left, 
she spends some hours of the night in plaiting straw or 
making baskets. 

One who has not seen something of the condition of 
the people here can scarcely form an idea as to their pov- 
erty and wretchedness. Poorly housed, poorly clothed, 
and poorly fed, they work like galley-slaves, for the very 
least sum that will keep life in the body. When sickness 
comes to them, and their scanty wages are cut off, begging 
or stealing is their only resource, and they do both. To us 
the women appear coarse, and they are coarse, but how can 
they be otherwise? The .finer sensibilities are crushed out 
of their lives by their hard lot. The sunshine of a comfort- 
able home is not theirs. The tender regard for wife and 
mother is entirely wanting. Their lives are so many des- 
perate daily struggles for an existence, and in this struggle 
they often fail. They become dull-eyed and haggard, and 
learn to know what the pangs of hunger are. 

We have given but a brief sketch of what we have seen. 
Our time was much too limited to give this subject much 
attention. What we have seen only confirms us in our con- 
viction that in no country in the world are the people, as a 
whole, so prosperous as in the United States. In no other 
country is labor better paid. Every laboring man may, by 
practicing ordinary economy and not spending his wages 
for tobacco and strong drink, lay by some money each year, 
and thus have a surplus capital. Notwithstanding all this, 



104 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

much dissatisfaction prevails. Men, who receive for a 
month's work double as much as laborers here receive for a 
year's labor, are striking for higher wages. We are un- 
grateful and fail to appreciate the blessings we enjoy, and, 
unless we are much mistaken, this ingratitude will bring its 
own punishment. Will the conditions found in southern 
Italy, and, indeed, all over Europe, ever exist in our own 
country? Perhaps for our ingratitude they may come. God 
uses various means to bring about results, and the means to 
this end are at work now. An ungrateful people, forgetting 
the abundant blessings of Almighty God, will surely re- 
ceive their just recompense of reward. 



CHAPTER VI. 



From E2irope to Africa—Last View of Vesuvius— Stromboli— Port 
Said. — The Suez Canal. — Ismailia. — Cairo. — Street Scenes. — 
Water-carriers . 

FTER spending a week at Naples and in its vicinity, 
we board the oriental steamer Rosetta, bound for 
Calcutta, India, and set sail for the " land of the 
Pharaohs," eleven hundred miles away. Steaming 
out of the beautiful Bay of Naples we see five of the great 
warships belonging to the Italian navy, among which are 
said to be some of the heaviest and best steel-plated ships 
yet constructed. It is a sad commentary on the professed 
Christianity of Europe when we reflect that all these Chris- 
tian (?) nations are literally armed to the teeth to protect 
themselves from the depredations of each other. Italy, 
with a population less than half of our own, has a standing 
army larger by ten times than that of the United States. 
To support her large army the people are ground down by 
taxation. No wonder poverty and begging are so very 
common in sunny Italy. 

Across the Bay of Naples, in the clear evening light, 
we have a last view of Mount Vesuvius rising in isolated 
grandeur from the surrounding plain. The mountain pours 
forth volume after volume of smoke, giving evidence of the 
great fire imprisoned in its bosom, and we see the last of it 
only when we are far out at sea, on our way to another of 

the great natural divisions of our globe, Africa. 
105 



I0 6 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

It is a bright, beautiful night, and although it is past 
the middle of December, it is as warm as the spring months 
at home. The sky is as clear as crystal, and the stars shine 
with an unusual degree of brilliancy, not uncommon in this 
favored climate. It must have been a night like this that 
inspired David to say, "The heavens declare the glory of 
God; and the firmament showeth his handywork. Day un- 
to day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth 
knowledge." It is not a night for sleep, and we spend a 
part of it on deck. At two o'clock in the morning we pass 
the island on which is located the active volcano Stromboli. 
At intervals of half an hour the mountain belches forth 
great volumes of fire and melted lava. The bright red 
flames are at least a hundred feet high, lighting up the 
mountain with their lurid glare; great streams of melted 
lava, red and glowing, pour down the mountain side to the 
level of the sea. It is a grand display of nature's fireworks, 
once seen never to be forgotten. 

Our voyage from Naples to Port Said is a pleasant one. 
The " great sea " is as smooth as a river, and we have clear 
and calm weather during the entire voyage. On the third 
day out we " sail close by Crete," so close that we can dis- 
tinctly see the coast line of the island, and we know that 
we are not far from the course taken by the ship which 
conveyed Paul to the port from which we have sailed. 

On the morning of the fourth day we catch sight of 
a level coast line, and with the aid of our glass we can see 
the buildings of Port Said, which stands at the entrance to 
the Suez Canal. An hour later our ship casts anchor and 
the health officer comes aboard. After a careful examina- 
tion (for owing to the prevalence of cholera in Europe they 
have rigid quarantine regulations here), the Rosetta is de- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



107 



clared free. Going down the ship's ladder and entering a 
small boat we are rowed ashore and land in Africa. Our 
first care on landing is to telegraph to loved ones at home 
of our safe arrival in Egypt. A single word of a private ci- 
pher, arranged before we left home, was flashed over a con- 
tinent and beneath the waters of the Atlantic, and half way 
across the United States, a distance of seven thousand 
miles, taking to anxious hearts at home news of our safety 
and good health. 

IN THE LAND OF EGYPT. 

And now at last we are in the land of the Pharaohs. 
Nine years ago when we visited Palestine our desire was to 
visit Egypt also, but at that time a war among the tribes on 
the Nile prevented us. Last winter we started for the 
East, but the way was closed by the cholera, and we turned 
homeward. Now, after the lapse of a number of years 
since we first thought the trip possible for us, we are, under 
God's blessing, permitted to realize our hopes and desires. 

We are to see this wonderland of the Nile. We are to 
climb the great pyramids and enter the tombs and temples, 
cut and built by the Pharaohs who lived with Joseph, Jacob 
and Moses. We are to wander through the "land of Go- 
shen," where the children of Israel dwelt, where they felt 
the heavy hand of oppression, and from which they were 
led by the hand of Moses. We are to follow them in their 
journey to the Red Sea and into the desert where they wan- 
dered forty years. We are to ascend the life-giving waters 
of the Nile a thousand miles, and visit on the way the mag- 
nificent ruins of Thebes, Karnac and Luxor. We are to 
continue our journey into Nubia,following the Nile into the 
Torrid Zone of Africa, and learn something of the life of 



108 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

the people who live there. All this we hope to accom- 
plish, the Lord being our keeper. 

And then, on our homeward journey, a kind Provi- 
dence permitting, we shall revisit the Holy Land, and, if 
possible, see the seven churches of Asia, which were estab- 
lished through the efforts of the great missionary, Paul. 

We feel that we are enjoying a great privilege in being 
thus permitted to wander in the Lands of the Bible. As 
Dr. SchafT so well says, it is an inestimable advantage to 
see with one's own eyes the birthplaces of the authors of 
the sacred writings, and their surroundings, and to be able 
to speak from personal experience and observation. The 
manners and customs of the people in the East are so un- 
changeable that we are transferred, as if by magic, to the 
age of the patriarchs, prophets and apostles. A flood of 
light is thrown on the meaning of many passages of Scrip- 
ture which appear strange at a distance, but quite natural on 
the spot. The thoughtful traveler fills his memory with 
scenes more valuable to him than any number of books; 
whenever he reads afterwards of the visits of Abraham, Jo- 
seph and Jacob to Egypt, the miracles of Moses, the wan- 
derings of the Israelites, of Hebron, Bethlehem, Nazareth, 
the Dead Sea, the River Jordan, the Lake of Gennesaret, 
Mount Hermon, the Cedars of Lebanon, Jerusalem, Beth- 
any, Gethsemane, and Mount Olivet, the places and scenes 
rise' before him with a vividness they never had before. 
The ruinous condition of the Lands of the Bible may di- 
minish the poetry, but the impression of the reality is deep- 
ened. A sound and correct historical understanding of the 
Bible has gained much from travelers who have made a 
study of the land where the Book was written, and it will 
gain still more in time to' come. For the Holy Scriptures 
have a human body as well as a divine soul; they strike 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 109 

their roots deep into the soil from which they sprang; 
while their ideas soar to heaven, they are thoroughly orien- 
tal, and yet wonderfully adapted for all mankind, in all 
ages of the world.* 

And now, at the very outset of our journeyings in 
Egypt, the question arises, What shall we write? The land 
of the Nile is so rich in historic interest and sacred associa- 
tion that the wandering editor finds no lack of material, and 
these letters might be expanded into volumes without ex- 
hausting the subject. To select from the great mass of ma- 
terial such matter as will be best suited and of the greatest 
interest and benefit to our readers, is a matter of consider- 
able importance. A glance at the magnitude of the sub- 
ject will more fully illustrate our meaning. 

The history of Egypt dates far back into the ages of 
antiquity, and fades away among the earliest traditions of 
the human race. When God called Abram from his home 
in the land of Mesopotamia to go " unto a land that I will 
shew thee," a prosperous nation with considerable knowl- 
edge of the arts and sciences dwelt in Egypt. Civilization 
prevailed, and the records show that, for centuries before 
Abram's call, the Pharaohs reigned in the land of the Nile. 
They founded cities, built temples and pyramids, erected 
monuments, and cut immense tombs in the rocks, the ruins 
of which are the wonder of the world to this day. After 
Abram left his own country and settled in Canaan, the his- 
tory of Egypt touches the Bible narrative at many points; 
and no country in the world, outside of the Holy Land it- 
self, has so many associations directly connected with the 
Bible record. 

The world owes a debt of gratitude to Egypt that is 
not fully recognized. It preserved the Jewish race. Soon 

*Schaff, " Through Bible Lands." 



ll0 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

after Abram made his home in Palestine he was compelled 
by famine to seek food from the fertile soil on the banks 
of the Nile, "And there was a famine in the land: and 
Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the 
famine was sore in the land." Gen. 12: 10. Two hundred 
years later we have the beautiful story of Joseph, known 
wherever the Bible is read, and again the Hebrews are pre- 
served. And Jacob said to his sons, " I have heard that 
there is corn in Egypt: get you down thither, and buy for 
us from thence; that we may live, and not die." The corn 
was bought, the line of Judah was preserved, and Egypt 
gave to the world a great law-giver, Moses the Hebrew. 
Fifteen hundred years later a babe, greater than Pharaoh, 
greater than Moses, greater than the prophets, was carried 
from Bethlehem down into Egypt. The Son of God, the 
Savior of the world was preserved from the cruel hatred 
of Herod, and the Scripture was fulfilled which saith, "Out 
of Egypt have I called my son." 

We have taken but a glimpse of the rich mass of ma- 
terials from which we are to draw our letters. The very 
richness of the field makes the task of writing the more dif- 
ficult. What to select that will be most interesting and in- 
structive is not so easy to decide. We shall, however, do 
the best we can in culling from the abundant material at 
hand. To write about all that is of interest in the land of 
the Pharaohs would be to write many volumes. 

From Port Said to Cairo we travel first by Egyptian 
mail boat on the Suez Canal to Ismailia, and thence by 
rail to the capital of modern Egypt. 

The Suez Canal, which unites the waters of the Medi- 
terranean and Red Seas, is a wonderful achievement of 
engineering skill. It is one hundred miles in length, 
seventy-two feet wide at the bottom, and from two hun- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. Ill 

dred to three hundred and sixty feet wide on the surface. 
A regular depth of twenty-six feet of water is maintained, 
so that the largest ships may pass through. The canal is 
controlled by English capital, but is open to the vessels of 
all nations. Two dollars is charged for each passenger 
who passes through the canal, and the same amount for 
each ton of freight. The large revenue thus collected 
keeps the canal in repair and pays a handsome dividend on 
the capital. 

From Ismailia to Cairo by rail, a distance of ninety- 
eight miles, we pass over a part of the Arabian Desert, and 
have an amount of dust and sand that makes breathing a 
difficult matter. The compartments are filled with dust 
and by the time we reach Cairo our clothing has entire- 
ly changed color, being literally covered with the white 
dust of the desert. 

Forty miles of desert travel brings us to the Land of 
Goshen, where the sons of Jacob took up their abode when 
they went down into Egypt. "And Pharaoh spake unto 
Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy brethren are come unto 
thee: the land of Egypt is before thee; in the best of the 
land make thy father and brethren to dwell; in the land of 
Goshen let them dwell: and if thou knowest any men of ac- 
tivity among them, then make them rulers over my cattle." 
Gen. 47: 5, 6. Unto this day the Land of Goshen is fertile. 
Canals lead the waters from the Nile to this favored dis- 
trict, and its green fields look especially attractive after the 
desert trip. 

Crossing over the Land of Goshen we pass by Tell El 
Yehudiyeh (Hill of the Jews). Here Onias the high priest, 
B. C. 146, under the protection of Ptolemy Philometor, 
built a temple for the use of his countrymen who had been 
expelled from Palestine. When it was said to him that no 



1I2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

true temple could exist except at Jerusalem, he quoted in 
answer the language of Isaiah, " In that day shall there be 
an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and 
a pillar at the border thereof to the Lord." Isa. 19: 19. 

But we leave the Land of Goshen for a later and 
more extended visit, when we hope to visit the ruins of the 
treasure cities of Pithom and Raamses, built by the Israel- 
ites for the Pharaoh of the oppression, Rameses II. 
"Therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict 
them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh 
treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses." Ex. 1. : 11. These 
important cities have recently been discovered and exca- 
vated by the Egyptian Exploration Society, and add addi- 
tional proof to the already great mass of evidence of the 
truth of the Book of God. We shall have something more 
to say of Goshen on our return from Ethiopia. 

From the window of our compartment we see in the 
distance a large city with numerous mosques and minarets. 
As we draw nearer to the place we have a glimpse of the 
top of a great pyramid, and all doubt as to the name of the 
city vanishes. It can be no other than Cairo, the city of 
the Khaliffs Our train pulls into a large depot, and we are 
at once surrounded by a yelling mob of Arab donkey-boys, 
guides and cab-drivers. The noise is deafening, and con- 
fusion reigns supreme. Having taken the precaution to 
notify the proprietor of the Khedival Hotel of our arrival, 
we remain quietly in the car until we hear some one call- 
ing " Mr Mee-ler." It is the commissionnaire ot the no- 
te! 'who speaks a few words in English. Calling him to us, 
we place our baggage and ourselves in his charge, and are 
soon rid of the crowd and comfortably located in a quiet, 
pleasant, home-like hotel. ■ 

Cairo is the one great oriental city in the world It has 
an estimated population of four hundred thousand souls. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 1 1 3 

Among its permanent residents may be found Italians 
Frenchmen, Germans, Englishmen, Americans, Austrians, 
Greeks, together with Egyptians, Arabians, Fellah Settlers, 
Copts, Jews, Northern Africans, Beduins, Syrians, Persians, 
Indians, Negroes, and other oriental races. With its mixed 
population and peculiar customs it is one of the most inter- 
esting cities in the world. 

The business streets on which the retail shops are lo- 
cated, "bazaars," as they are called here, present a striking 
appearance, and are filled with strange sights and scenes. 
We have traveled from the New World to the Old, but here 
in this oriental city is a world entirely new to us. Here we 
have presented to us in the same street the contrasts be- 
tween barbarous, half-civilized and civilized life. It is a 
kind of mosaic of the customs and habits of many nations 
of the earth. It has well been called a living museum of 
all imaginable and unimaginable phases of existence, of re- 
finement and degeneracy, of civilization and barbarism, of 
knowledge and ignorance, of Paganism, Christianity, and 
Mohammedanism. 

Of the Muski, the principal business street, Baedeker 
says, " The busy traffic in this street often presents an in- 
terminably ravelled and twisted string of men, women, and 
animals, of walkers, riders and carriages of every descrip- 
tion. Add to this the cracking of drivers' whips, the jing- 
ling of the money at the tables of the changers, established 
at the corner of every street, the rattling of the brazen cups 
of the water-carriers, the moaning of the camels, the bray- 
ing of donkeys, and barking of dogs, and you have a per- 
fect pandemonium." 

Then, too, this great mass of moving, struggling hu- 
manity presents almost every variety of costume and style 
of dress, Here are the fashionably-dressed Europeans, el- 



II4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

bowing the scantily-clad Ethiopian from Upper Nubia; and 
between these two extremes may be seen a wonderful varie- 
ty of wearing apparel. Here are turbaned Turks, with bag- 
gy trousers and richly embroidered vestments; the Beduin 
of the desert, with simple robe and highly-colored head- 
dress, kept in place by a black cord, half an inch thick, 
from which hang heavy tassels; the descendants of Mo- 
hammed in flowing robes and green turbans; the Nubian, 
bare-headed, bare-armed and bare-legged, his dark skin 
glistening in the bright sunlight; the richly-dressed, 
closely-veiled women of the harem, enveloped in great 
robes of black silk; the poorer women with a simple blue 
gown and a veil covering the lower part of the face, with a 
profusion of copper earrings, bracelets, ankle-rings, and, 
in the case of the inhabitants of Upper Egypt, nose-rings. 
All these go to make up a scene as bewildering as it is 
possible to imagine and leave on the mind of the traveler 
an impression not soon to be forgotten. 

The Elder and the writer threaded the business streets 
of Cairo the second day after our arrival. We selected the 
afternoon, when the scene is most animated. We were 
mounted on trusty little donkeys, and our only attendants 
were two intelligent Arab donkey-boys. One of them, Ali, 
spoke a little English, of which he seemed very proud. At 
the word " Yallah," which is Arabic for forward, we started 
on our tour of the shops and bazaars of Cairo, and we en- 
joyed an excellent opportunity of seeing the busy streets 
and the many phases of life which they present. It was an 
interesting ride. The denseness of the crowd, as it moved 
slowly forward, seemed at times to wholly block our way, 
but our donkey-boys, Hammar, as they are called here, 
elbowed a passageway for us and we got through in safety. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. I 1 5 

Every department of business is kept separate, and 
many of the articles offered for sale are manufactured on 
the streets. We pass through a street wholly given up to 
the shoemakers, and here are made and sold the red and 
yellow slippers worn by the natives. In another street are 
the booksellers and bookbinders, and you may see the pro- 
cess of binding books carried on in the streets. So, too, 
the brass beaters, the silversmiths, the wood-workers, and 
other craftsmen carry on their work in the open air. The 
entire business of the city is carried on in this way, and it 
presents a striking contrast to our methods of business at 
home. 

One of the familiar sights in Cairo is that of the 
Sais, or outrunners. This ancient custom is still main- 
tained. Before the carriages of the wealthy one or two 
men run, giving notice of the coming of the carriage, and 
clearing the way for it. We saw them a number of times 
and were impressed with their fleetness of foot and wonder- 
ful power of endurance. In the broad avenues they run 
before the fast trotting horses and manage to keep well in 
the lead. The custom is an eastern one and is as old as 
the Bible. Elijah the prophet performed this service at 
one time for Ahab. " And he said, Go up, say unto Ahab, 
Prepare thy chariot, and get thee down, that the rain stop 
thee not. And it came to pass in the mean while, that the 
heaven was black with clouds and wind, and there was a 
great rain. And Ahab rode, and went to Jezreel. And the 
hand of the Lord was on Elijah; and he girded up his loins, 
and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel." I Kings 
18: 44-46. 

Then there is the sakka, or water-carrier, with his goat- 
skin of water slung across his back and shoulders, carrying 
the water from the Nile to the houses, or offering to sell it 



H5 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

to the people in the streets. He offers a drink in small 
brazen cups, which he rattles in his hands, calling out to 
the passers to come and buy. It was from this ancient cus- 
tom of calling to the thirsty to come and buy water that 
the beautiful figure, found in Isa. 55:1, was drawn, " Ho, 
every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that 
hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy 
wine and milk without money and without price." 

The sakka also serves in the capacity of a street 
sprinkler. With his goatskin bottle filled with water (and 
they hold from five to ten gallons, according to size) he 
takes the neck in his hand and, by a dextrous movement of 
the hand and arm, throws the water in a shower of spray 
for a considerable distance all around him. We saw a 
number of men engaged at this kind of work. It is surpris- 
ing to see how far they could throw the water and how well 
and rapidly they sprinkled the dusty streets. He carries 
his heavy burden from the Nile, and is but poorly paid for 
his work. He tries to lighten his toil by repeating in a 
monotone the words, " Ya auwad Allah!' (May God rec- 
ompense me.) 

The donkeys and donkey-boys are an important insti- 
tution in Cairo. They supply the place of cabs and street 
railways for those who do not care to pay the high price 
asked for carriages. For a short ride inside the city you 
pay from five to ten cents, according to distance. Or you 
may hire a donkey and boy by the day for less than one 
dollar. The donkey and the boy always go together, and 
it is usual, after a day's ride, to give the latter a piaster 
(about five cents) as backsheesh. After a little practice, 
donkey-riding becomes an easy, comfortable and very con- 
venient mode of travel. The animals are gentle and have 
an easy pace, even when they gallop, and the boys are 



An Egyptian Donkey-Boy. 



v 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 1 1 7 

bright and intelligent. Many of them speak a little Eng- 
lish. They have wonderful powers of endurance. Our 
boys followed us one day some fifteen miles, nearly half 
the distance being across the sandy desert to Sakkara, and 
the entire journey was made in three hours. 

They are always anxious to talk and learn more of our 
language. They never tire of praising their donkeys, and 
we hear many times repeated that ours is "very 'good don- 
key, he understand English." One of our boys, whose * 
name was Abdul Moses, was exceptionally bright and in- 
telligent. We asked him if he made much money. His 
reply was: "Sometimes money plenty, sometimes no mon- 
ey. When money plenty, Moses have plenty friends; ev- 
erybody say, 'Good morning, Moses;' when money finish, 
Moses finish." Even the donkey-boys in Egypt have 
learned the lesson that prosperity brings many friends, 
whilst adversity sees them drop away one by one. The 
sentence, "When money finish, Moses finish," though 
spoken by a simple Arab donkey-boy, tells the experience 
of thousands all over this broad earth, who, when they lost 
their money, lost their fawning friends. While this is true, 
we are glad to know that there are friends who are true, 
even in adversity, and, above all, that there is a Friend that 
sticketh closer than a brother. Of this Friend the Arab 
donkey-boy has no knowledge; and what a field is open 
here for the missionary of the cross! 

At this writing we are in Nubia, the Ethiopia or Cush 
of the Bible. We are in the enjoyment of excellent health. 
Hitherto the Lord has been our helper, and we praise his 
holy name. 

Our mail reached us at Assuan on the borderland of 
Nubia. How glad we were to get good news from home. 
The letters were written and mailed nearly a month before 



118 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

we received them. It brought very vividly to mind the 
fact that we were many thousand miles from home and 
loved ones. And while we were glad to hear from them 
and would be loath to do without letters, yet they brought, 
to the writer's heart at least, the yearning for home, the 
meaning of which is known only to those who have felt it. 



CHAPTER VII. 



— % — 

The Pyramid of Cheops —Climbing the Great Pyramid.— View from 
the Top.— The Interior— Grand Gallery —The King s Chamber.— 
The Queen's Chamber.— The Sphinx— The Granite Temple. 

VERYTHING fears time, but time fears the Pyra- 
mids," wrote an Arabian physician (Abdellatiff ) at, 
the close of the eleventh century. Eight hundred 
years have been numbered in the flight of time 
since the Arabian wrote, and still the old pyramids, 
old when Abraham first visited Egypt, older still when Mo- 
ses was born, stand in their solitary grandeur on the verge 
of the Libyan desert plain. Time has dealt gently with 
these huge structures, and, although the Greeks, Romans, 
and Saracens robbed them of their polished granite casing, 
they are as imposing in their grandeur to-day as they were 
a thousand years ago. They are standing yet, one of the 
wonders of the world, and they will doubtless stand until it 
shall be declared that time shall be no more. 

"A visit to the pyramids," says Dr. Schaff, "is an 
event in a man's life. It is worth a visit to Egypt. The 
pyramids and the sphinxes are the fittest symbols, the best 
welcome, and the best farewell to the land of the Pharaohs, 
who themselves rose like pyramids, in solitary grandeur, 
far above the desert plain of slavery around them." We 
are not prepared to say that the pyramids are worth a trip 
from America to Egypt, but having come to Egypt, no one 
would think of going away without seeing these great mass- 
es of masonry. 
119 




12Q WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Our visit to the pyramids was made Dec. 26, 1892, a 
day long to be remembered. A carriage drive of seven 
miles, through the streets of Cairo, across the Nile bridge, 
along a splendid road (completely shaded by rows of aca- 
cia trees) on which we met numerous caravans of camels 
on their way to Cairo, brought us to the edge of the desert. 
On the way we caught occasional glimpses of pyramids, 
and as we approached them they seemed to grow in size. 
But it was not until the edge of the desert was reached, the 
long, sandy slope and the rocky platform had been 
climbed, and we stood at the foot of the Great Pyramid of 
Cheops, that we realized how stupendous the great struc- 
ture was. The effect was quite overwhelming. The pyra- 
mid shuts off the line of the horizon, and hides behind its 
massive squares six smaller structures of the same charac- 
ter. 

Standing on the rocky platform which forms the foun- 
dation of the Great Pyramid, we had our first realization of 
its extent and magnitude. We had seen pictures of Cheops, 
a name given to the largest pyramid, in our school-books 
forty-five years ago. Since then we have read numer- 
ous interesting descriptions of it, and, especially during 
the last few years, we have carefully studied the plan of its 
construction and its measurements. We have also exam- 
ined photographs and drawings of it, and yet we were only 
acquainted with its general appearance and form. Of its 
size we really knew but little save the figures, which fail to 
convey to the mind the reality. 

We knew that its base originally covered an area of 
sixty-five thousand square feet, that each of its four base 
lines was seven hundred and sixty-eight feet long, that it 
was nearly five hundred feet high, that it contained no less 
than three and a quarter million cubic feet of masonry, and 



122 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



that the entire weight of the stones in the structure was 
more than seven million tons. But these figures, with 
which we were familiar, had not been fully grasped by the 
mind. They had not given to us an adequate conception 
of the reality. In order to obtain this, one must stand at 
the foot of the monster, walk the length of each of its four 
sides, climb step after step of its cyclopean masonry, until, 
wearied by the exertion, he sinks down to rest on the top- 
most tier. Only after an experience of this kind did we 
fully realize the great magnitude of this, the most colossal 
structure ever erected by human hands. 

The campus of Mount Morris College contains seven 
acres. If we add as much more to this, so as to make a 
square plat of ground containing fourteen acres, we shall 
have a piece of ground about the size of that originally cov- 
ered by trie Great Pyramid. If it were farmed it would re- 
quire a man with two horses seven days to plough it, and 
in some of our western states would produce a thousand 
bushels of corn. 

On this plat of ground containing more than thirteen 
acres the builders of the pyramid erected a four-sided 
structure, the greatest the world has ever seen. It is fifty- 
three feet higher than the dome of St. Peter's church in 
Rome and is within a few feet as high as the Washington 
Monument. There are two hundred and nine courses of 
squared blocks of stone cut and fit together with wonderful 
accuracy. The courses differ in thickness, the thickest be- 
ing four feet and eight inches and the next four feet. Up 
to the fiftieth course the blocks are not less than three feet 
thick. From this to the top they decrease in thickness un- 
til they fall below two feet. Ford says these blocks of 
rock were laid course upon course, on this foundation of 
thirteen acres, up, and still up, stone upon stone, to the im- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



123 



mense height of nearly five hundred feet. These solid 
blocks of rock, one of which it would take an average of 
two hundred men to raise an eighth of an inch from the 
ground, were lifted high up in the air, and swung into their 
destined places with an exactness that varies not a fraction 
of an inch. By what machinery, what derricks and levers 
and pulleys, what engineering contrivances these massive 
blocks were thus raised and placed in position, the science 
of this boasted nineteenth century cannot even guess. 
These practical illustrations will assist us in obtaining an 
idea of the extent and magnitude of Cheops. 

When were the great pyramids built, and what were 
they built for? These questions have been asked and nev- 
er fully answered. Various dates are assigned as the time 
of their construction, ranging from B. C. 2,000 to B. C. 
3,000. We shall not enter upon a discussion of this ques- 
tion. Space forbids, and then volumes have already been 
written upon the question involved. An examination of 
the subject leads us to the conclusion that they have stood 
on the banks of the Nile for more than four thousand 
years. 

Herodotus, who is called the father of history, and who 
wrote four hundred and fifteen years before Christ, says 
that the Great Pyramid was built by Cheops, and that he 
employed one hundred thousand men in the work. "They 
took ten years to make the road for the transport of the 
stone, which, in my opinion, must have been almost as la- 
borious a task as the building of the pyramid itself; for the 
length of the road was five stadia (one thousand and seven- 
teen yards); its breadth is ten fathoms (sixty feet), and its 
height, at the highest places is eight fathoms (forty-eight 
feet), and it is constructed entirely of polished stone, with 



124 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

figures engraved on it * Ten years were thus consumed in 
making this road, and the subterranean chambers on the 
hill occupied by the pyramids. . . . Now the construc- 
tion of the pyramids occupied twenty years. Each of the 
sides, which face the different points of the compass, for 
there are four sides measuring eight pletra (eight hundred 
and twenty feet), and the height is the same. It is covered 
with polished stones, well jointed, none of which are less 
than thirty feet long. 

"This pyrmaid was first built in the form of a flight of 
steps. After the workmen had completed the pyramid in 
this form, they raised the other stones, used for the incrus- 
tation, by means of machines, made of short beams, from 
the ground to the first tier of steps; and after the stone was 
placed there it was raised to the second tier by another ma- 
chine; for there were as many machines as there were tiers 
of steps; or perhaps the same machine, if it was easily 
moved, was raised from one tier to the other, as it was re- 
quired for lifting the stones. The highest part of the pyr- 
amid was thus finished first, the parts adjoining it were 
taken next, and the lowest part, next to the earth, was 
completed last.f " 

As to the object for which they were built, it was the 
opinion of all who had examined the pyramids that they 
were intended as tombs for the bodies of the kings who 
constructed them. In 1837 Col. Howard Nyse made some 
measurements of the Great Pyramid, and suggested that it 
was not built for a tomb, but that it embodied the highest 
development of scientific skill, and that it contained a 
prophecy of the first and second coming of Christ. This 

*This road is still traceable. 

tRecent investigations confirm this account of the building of the pyramids. Of 
course it will be understood that the latter part of the description refers to the puttmg 
on of the outside layer of polished granite stones. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



125 



theory was carried farther by John Taylor, of London, from 
1859 to 1864. It however remained for Mr. Piazzi Smyth, 
Astronomer Royal of Scotland, to fully complete the the- 
ory thus advanced. 

In 1874 Prof. Smyth with his wife spent four months 
at the Great Pyramid, and carefully measured it, examined 
its mathematical features and proportions. He had at his 
command the best mathematical and scientific instruments, 
and made very careful and painstaking measurements. 

His conclusions are given at great length in his works, 
"Life and Work at the Great Pyramid," and, "Our Inheri- 
tance in the Great Pyramid," in four volumes. We are in- 
debted to Dr. Schaff for the following synopsis of Prof. 
Smyth's theory.* 

He finds the proper solution of the riddle of this pyr- 
amid, not in the hieroglyphic science of Egypt, but in the 
mathematical and physical science of our day. Its mes- 
sage is expressed not in any written or spoken language, 
but in facts and features now interpreted by science. Ac- 
cordingly the pyramid is a prophetic parable in stone, con- 
structed on the principles of science, to convey a new 
proof to men in the present age of the existence of a per- 
sonal God, his supernatural interference in patriarchal 
times, and his revelation of the first and second advent of 
Christ. The pyramid stands at the apex (or rather ten 
miles south of the apex of the delta of the Nile), and in 
the centre of the habitable globe, or the land surface of 
the earth. It stands four square on the thirtieth parallel 
of latitude, its four sides facing exactly the four points of 
the compass, — north, south, east, and west. There are, in 
each side of the base, just three hundred and sixty-five and 
one-fourth cubits, which is the precise number of days in 

*" Through Bible Lands." Dr. Philip Schaff. 



I2 g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

the year with six hours added. Its chief corner-stone is 
not at the base, but at the top, the apex, and symbolizes 
Christ, " the head stone of the corner." Ps. 1 18: 22. It has 
no trace of idolatry in writing, painting, or sculpture. The 
lidless and empty coffer in the King's Chamber was never 
intended for a sarcophagus or royal tomb, but it is a metro- 
logical monument, or standard of measure of capacity for 
all ages and nations, equivalent to the laver of the He- 
brews and the four quarters of English measure. It ac- 
complishes the mathematical feat of squaring the circle, the 
height being to the circumference of the base as the radi- 
us is to the circumference of a circle. The very name of 
the pyramid means "measure of wheat" (from puros, 
wheat, and metron, measure). The Grand Gallery, which 
leads to the King's Chamber, symbolizes the Christian dis- 
pensation, and indicates in pyramid inches the thirty-three 
years of the Savior's earth life. The first ascending pas- 
sage represents the Mosaic dispensation, the other narrow 
passages mean lower religions. Such profound designs 
and wisdom can only be traced to divine revelation, like 
the building of the tabernacle by Moses. The Great Pyr- 
amid though in Egypt, was not of Egypt, but stands in 
contrast to Egyptian idolatry and beast worship. It was 
probably built by Melchisedec, the friend of Abraham, the 
worshiper of the only True God, the priest-king who typi- 
fied our Savior. He was that mysterious stranger, the 
Shepherd " Philitis" or Philition, a Philistian from Pal- 
estine, who, as Herodotus was informed, fed his flocks at 
G^ezeh, at the place and at the time when the Great Pyra- 
mid was built, and took some part in it. Cheops merely 
furnished the workmen and the material for his royal sepul- 
chre" but Melchisedec executed his plan, revealed to him 
from God, for a monument of the pure faith, in the imdst 



Wanderings in bible lands. 127 

of surrounding idolatry, and as a sign and wonder for aft- 
er ages. 

Such is the theory given to the world by Prof. Smyth, 
a man eminent for his learning and acquirements in scien- 
tific work. Since the publication of his works on the pyr- 
amid, a number of writers, both English and American, 
have accepted his views, and have also written and pub- 
lished books on the subject. No one can dispute the 
correctness of the Professor's measurements; but the con- 
clusion he draws, and the speculations in which he indulges, 
meet the objections of the best Egyptian scholars, and the 
theory seems to meet less favor now than it did twenty 
years ago. 

Our readers will have noticed the statement that the 
Great Pyramid stands exactly on the thirtieth parallel of 
North Latitude and that its four sides face the four points 
of the compass. The exact and scientific manner in which 
this has been done leaves no doubt that the builders had 
a very correct and thorough knowledge of astronomy. 
The placing of a building exactly with the points of the 
compass is called by astronomers orientation. 

Richard Proctor, one of the greatest of modern astron- 
omers, says: " I think if there is one purpose among, prob- 
ably, many which the builders had in their thoughts which 
can be unmistakably inferred from the pyramids them- 
selves, independently of all traditions, it is the purpose of 
constructing edifices which should enable men to observe 
the heavenly bodies in some way not otherwise obtainable. 
If the orienting of the faces of the pyramids, that is, plac- 
ing them to the points of the compass, had been effected 
in some such way as is used in the orienting of most of our 
churches and cathedrals,— that is in a manner sufficiently 
exact as tested by ordinary observation, — it might reason- 



I2 8 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

ably enough be inferred, that having to erect square build- 
ings for any purpose whatever, men were likely enough to 
set them four square to the cardinal points, and that there- 
fore no stress can be laid on this feature of the pyramids' 
construction. But when we find that the orienting of the 
pyramid has been effected with extreme care, that in the 
case of the Great Pyramid, which is typical of its kind, the 
orienting bears the closest astronomical scrutiny, we can 
not doubt that this feature indicates an astronomical pur- 
pose as surely as it indicates astronomical methods."* 

Prof. Smyth in his measurements used the finest and 
most accurate astronomical instruments of this wonderful 
age of invention and improvement, and he found that the 
men who built the Great Pyramid more than four thousand 
years ago measured just as accurately as he could, that 
they found the center of that circle along which the Pole 
Star moves, found the spot in the heavens to which the 
earth's polar axis points— found the true north and reared 
a mighty building accordingly. And there it stands to- 
day, displaying a scientific knowledge equal to anything 
attained in this boasted age.f 

We climbed to the top of the Great Pyramid, a feat of 
some difficulty, when our. two hundred pounds avoirdupois 
is taken into consideration; but with the help of three 
Arabs, and a half hour's climbing and resting, we reached 
the top and found a platform thirty feet square. 

The Arabs who assisted in the ascent by pushing and 
pulling were strong, athletic fellows. They understand 
their business, which is to take travelers up and down and 
get all the backsheesh out of them they possibly can. 
They speak English, and encouraged me on the way up by 

* Contemporary Review, September, 1879. 
f" The Great Pyramid," page 29. 




Climbing the Great Pyramid. 



I30 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

saying, "You go up very good, very good Arab, you give 
me backsheesh." 

From the top of Cheops a magnificent view is had of 
the Nile Valley and the desert. The living green of the 
garden-like fields, and the yellow sand of the desert meet, 
and the line between the two is sharply marked. It is a 
picture of life and death set in sharp and striking contrast 
The fertile fields, receiving the life-giving waters of the 
Nile, are teeming with living green. Groves of palm trees, 
stately and majestic, dot all the plain to the east. The 
City of Cairo, with its mosques, minarets, citadel and 
domes, appears beyond the Nile like a jewel in a setting 
of emerald green. To the west an ocean of sand stretches 
away, far beyond the line of human vision. Silent and 
mysterious, it is a fit emblem of death. To the south the 
Nile, like a silver thread in a ribbon of green, reaches out 
toward the Nubian border. It is a wonderful panorama, 
and can be seen from no other spot in the world except 
from the top of the Great Pyramid. 

The descent of the pyramid, while not so difficult as 
the ascent, is exceedingly trying to the muscles of the low- 
er limbs, and one feels the effects for days after the exer- 
cise has been taken. After coming down we were beset on 
all sides by demands for backsheesh. Our guides who had 
been fully and amply paid for their service were now ask- 
ing for money with as much earnestness as if they had not 
been paid a cent. Even the dignified sheik of the pyra- 
mids, as the chief man of the Arab village is called, laid 
claim to a gratuity after we had paid him in full the price 
agreed upon. Out of sheer necessity, to rid ourselves of 
the importunate crowd, we distributed a few small coins 
and hurriedly left them comparing what they had received, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



Having climbed to the top of the Great Pyramid we 
determined to explore its interior. This was, in' some re- 
spects, a more difficult task than the first. On the outside 








1 










F J 








If 








■ A X 






V 


An 



•RAMIO. STCOWD PYRAMID. 

Diagram of the Great Pyramid. 



we had an abundance of pure fresh air and plenty of light. 
In the interior the darkness of Egypt is felt, the air is hot 



I32 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and stifling and smells strongly of bats. Most of the inte- 
rior passageways are low and narrow and the steep floors 
are very slippery. Here we must stoop and crawl to con- 
quer. Our trustworthy guide-book tells us that travelers at 
all predisposed to apoplectic or fainting fits should not by 
any means attempt to penetrate the stifling chambers of the 
interior. 

Before going into the narrow passageway we give the 
following measurements from Baedeker, which are approxi- 
mately correct. The diagram here given will assist in ob- 
taining a correct idea of the interior of Cheops. The let- 
ters in the diagram may be plainly seen with the aid of a 
magnifying glass. 

The entrance passage CCC is three feet, four inches in 
height and three feet, eleven inches in width. It descends 
in a straight direction at- an angle of twenty-six degrees and* 
forty-one seconds, and is altogether three hundred and 
nineteen and a half feet in length. The passage ends at F, 
a subterranean chamber excavated in the solid rock on 
which the pyramid rests. This chamber is not now accessi- 
ble. At DD on the diagram is the first ascending passage, 
one hundred and twenty-three feet in length. It ascends 
at the same angle as the first and reaches the Grand Gal- 
lery, L, and through it the King's Chamber, O. TT are air 
shafts made for the purpose of ventilating the King's 
Chamber. They are six by eight inches. The one on the 
north side is two hundred and thirty-four and the other one 
hundred and seventy-four feet long. At the entrance to 
the Grand Gallery a horizontal passage leads to the 
Queen's Chamber, I. This room is eighteen feet, ten inch- 
es long, seventeen feet wide and twenty feet, four inches 
high, including the pointed roof, which consists of enor- 
mous blocks of rock placed obliquely and leaning against 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



133 



each other, and projecting a distance of five and a half feet 
beyond the sides of the walls into the surrounding mason- 
ry. At the lower end of the Grand Gallery a shaft, EE, 
descends to the Chamber F. The dark line, XX, shows the 
forced passage cut and blasted by the Arabs A. D. 813-33, 
when they succeeded in finding the passage leading to the 
King's Chamber. ZZ show the outer granite casing of the 
Pyramid, long since removed. VV are the cartouches or 
names of the supposed builders of the pyramid. 

The entrance to Cheops is on the thirteenth layer, or 
tier of stones, and is on the north side of the structure, 
forty-eight feet above the ground. Having secured compe- 
tent and trusty guides with a good supply of torches and 
candles we enter the opening and find ourselves in a dark, 
rapidly-descending' passage, so low that we must stoop as 
much as possible in order to pass through. It is so steep 
that every step must be taken with great care. A slip 
would result in a serious disaster. The angle of descent is 
somewhat steeper than what is known as a quarter pitch 
comb roof. The stooping posture becomes very tiresome 
and makes the entrance so much the more difficult. The 
air is stifling hot and the sweat bursts from every pore in 
the body. The experience is something like a hot-air bath. 
After going down a distance of sixty feet we find a pas- 
sageway ascending at about the same angle, running in the 
direction of the center of the structure. Entering this and 
climbing up one hundred and twenty-three feet we enter 
the Grand Gallery, which is twenty-eight feet high, one 
hundred and twenty-three feet long, and seven feet at its 
greatest width. Here we stand erect, the first time since 
we entered the pyramid, and breathe and look about us 
with more freedom. As our torches light up the dark hall- 
way innumerable bats, disturbed in their slumbers, flit about 



134 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



us, flapping their wings in our faces, gnashing their teeth, 
and emitting an odor which makes the hot, stifling air almost 
unendurable. But we do not think of turning back. We 
came to see and are not 
to be deterred by these 
difficulties. Pressing 
on we reach the upper 
end of the hall and here 
burning some magnesi- 
um wire we have a light 
equal to that made by 
electricity, and the 
beauty of the Grand 
Gallery is revealed to 
us. The work of pol- 
ishing and jointing the 
great blocks of fine- 
grained limestone, with 
which the sides and 
roof of the hall are 
formed, has been done 
with wonderful accu- 
racy. The builders of 
this old pyramid pos- 
sessed an unsurpassable 
and marvelous skill in 
masonry. So smoothly 
are the stones polished 
and so closely and 
evenly joined together 
that you could not place 
the point of a needle or 

even the finest hair into the joints of the stones. One 




WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



135 



scarcely knows which to admire most, the great magnitude 
of the work or the wonderful skill shown by the workmen. 
Think of a structure containing seven million tons of solid 
stonework standing at least four thousand years! And the 
masonry of these interior chambers has not swerved a hair- 
breadth from the position in which it was laid so many cen- 
turies ago. 

At the end of the Grand Gallery is a small passage the 
entrance to which is shown in our engravings. The opening 
is so low that we must crawl in and through the passage, 
which is twenty-two feet long. After passing through we 
find ourselves in the King's Chamber, the most interesting 
part of the pyramid. The north and south sides of the 
chamber are each seventeen feet in length, the east and 
west sides thirty-four and a half feet, and the height is 
nineteen feet. The floor of the chamber is one hundred 
and thirty-nine and a half feet above the solid rock founda- 
tion upon which the pyramid stands. The walls, floor and 
ceiling are constructed of red granite brought from the 
quarries at Assuan. The granke blocks are beautifully pol- 
ished and are fitted together with wonderful skill. We 
searched at some places, even with the aid of a powerful 
magnesium light, for the joining seams between the stones, 
but were unable to make them out. Nine enormous slabs 
of polished granite, each eighteen and a half feet long, form 
the roof or ceiling of this beautiful chamber. In the center 
stands an empty, lidless coffer or sarcophagus, one corner 
of which has been broken away. It is seven and a half feet 
long, three feet, three inches wide and three feet, four inch- 
es high. It was cut from a large block of granite, the mas- 
sive sides of which ring with a clear tone when struck a 
heavy blow. It bears no trace of name or inscription of 
any kind. What was this granite coffer used for? Was it 



I36 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

the sarcophagus of one of the ancient kings of Egypt, or 
was it, as Smyth supposes, a sacred standard of measure? 
Who can answer the question? Empty and lidless it was 
found when an entrance was forced into the King's Cham- 
ber a thousand years ago, and so it stands to-day, guarding 
well its own secret. 

After spending some time in the King's Chamber we 
carefully retrace our steps. The Elder and the writer, with 
six Arabs, compose the party. We think of the English- 
man who was robbed of all his possessions in these dark 
galleries a few years ago, but as it is not pleasant to con- 
template we dismiss the thought. Going down the steep 
stone floor one of the Arabs slips and falls, but escapes 
without serious injury. At last we see the glimmering 
light at the entrance and emerge from the awe-inspiring 
chambers and galleries, glad to breathe again the pure air 
of heaven. 

We turn away from the pyramid with a feeling of awe. 
Having climbed to the top and crawled to its centre it 
seems greater and more stupendous than ever. It stands 
alone in its grandeur, "monarch of all that human hands 
have reared," and will doubtless stand until the earth and 
sea shall give up their dead. 

" I asked of Time: * To whom arose this high, 
Majestic pile, here mouldering in decay?' 
He answered not, but swifter sped his way, 
With ceaseless pinions winnowing the sky. 

" To Fame I turned: ' Speak thou whose sons defy 
The waste of years and deathless works essay! ' 
She heaved a sigh, as one to grief a prey, 
And silent, downward cast her eye. 

"Onward I passed, but sad and thoughtful grown; 
■ When, stern in aspect, o'er the ruined shrine, 
I saw oblivion stalk from stone to stone, 



WANDERINGS 



IN BIBLE LANDS. 



137 



" ' Dread Power! ' I cried, ' tell me, whose vast design? ' 
He checked my further speech, in sullen tone; 
'Whose once it was, I care not; now 'tis mine.' " 

We next visit the colossal Sphinx, about eight hun- 
dred steps from the Great Pyramid. It is one among the 
most famous monuments in Egypt. For thousands of 
years it has kept its silent, sleepless watch over the vast 




The Sphinx from the Northeast. 

burial-ground around the pyramids. Vedder, the great ar- 
tist, has painted a picture which he named " The Secret of 
the Sphinx!' " In the picture we see a brown, half-naked, 
toil-worn fellah laying his ear to the stone lips of a colos- 
sal sphinx, buried to the neck in sand. Some instinct of 
the old Egyptian blood tells him the creature is God-like. 
He is conscious of a great mystery lying far back in the 
past. He has, perhaps, a dim, confused notion that the 
Big Head knows it all, whatever it may be. He has never 
heard of the morning song of Memnon; but fancies, some- 
how, that those closed lips might speak if questioned. 



138 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



Fellah and sphinx are alone in the desert. It is night, and 
the stars are shining. Has he chosen the right hour? 
What does he seek to know? What does he hope to hear? 
Each must interpret for himself the secret of the sphinx."* 
The Sphinx is hewn out of the natural rock, but pieces 
of stone have been added when necessary. It has been 
moulded into the shape of a colossal lion in a recum- 
bent posture, with a human head. The body was left in a 
rough shape, but the head and face were carefully finished 
An early Arabian writer says that the face was very pleas- 
ing, of a graceful and beautiful type and that one might al- 
most say of it " that it smiles winningly." The body of the 
lion is one hundred and fifty feet long, the paws are fifty 
feet long and between them is a small temple. The dis- 
tance from the top of the head to the pavement on which 
the figure rests is about seventy feet. The head is thirty 
feet long and the face fourteen feet wide. The ear, accord- 
ing to Mariette, is four and a half feet, the nose five feet, 
seven inches, and the mouth seven feet, seven inches in 
length. These measurements do not convey to the mind 
the immense size of the monument. One must see it to 
fully realize what it is. The Sphinx is now but a ruin of 
what it once was. The face is much mutilated, but it is 
still imposing in its grandeur. The Arabs call it Abu 7 
holy " father of terror," derived from bel-hit, the watchful. 
" We shall die, and Islam shall wither away, and still that 
sleepless rock will be watching and watching the works of 
a new, busy race with the same sad, earnest eyes and the 
same sad, earnest mien everlastingly. You dare not mock 
the Sphinx." 

A few steps southeast of the Sphinx is a granite tem- 
ple, discovered by M. Mariette in 1853. The chambers are 

*A. B. Edwards. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



139 



kept free from sand and are easy of access. The material 
is alabaster and the red granite from Assuan. The archi- 
tecture is simple in style. The skill of the stone-cutter 
and mason is fully equal to that displayed in the Grand 
Gallery and King's Chamber of the pyramid. The great 
masses of granite are shaped with exquisite skill, and the 
lapse of ages has not moved them a hairbreadth from 
where the masons laid them. We spent but two days at 
the Pyramids and the Sphinx, only time enough to become 
fully impressed with the magnitude ana grandeur of these 
vast monuments of antiquity. 




The Granite Temple, the Sphinx and the Great Pyramid 
from the Southeast. 




Map of Egypt, The Heavy Lines Indicate the Author's Route. 



Map of Upper Egypt and Nubia. The Heavy Lines Indicate 
the Author s Route. 




CHAPTER VIII 



The Nile.— The Sakkieh and Shaduf.— Memphis, the Noph of the Bible. 
—Sakkara.— The Tombs.— Embalming the Dead.— The Serapeum. 
— The Temple of Tih.— The Step Pyramid.— Our Southward Way. 

f\VENTY years ago the Nile trip was one of much 
difficulty and could only be made by those who had 
plenty of money to spend. Steamboats now run 
regularly as far south as Assuan and at stated seasons as 
far south as Wady Haifa and the second cataract. The 
cost of a trip from Cairo to the second cataract and return 
by tourist steamer, including all expenses for dragoman, 
interpreters, donkeys and camels for excursions to visit 
ruined temples by the way, is about three hundred and fif- 
ty dollars. Something must be added to this for the inev- 
itable demand for backsheesh. 

All necessary arrangements are completed and on the 
twenty-sixth day of December we bid farewell to Cairo and 
go on board the small steamer Tervfik, which is to take us 
as far as Assuan on our journey southward. Our object 
in going up the Nile is to see the ruins of the old temples 
and the rock-cut tombs, which reveal to us to-day the his- 
tory of ancient Egypt and confirm the Bible story. Here 
on the banks of the Nile we shall see the quarries, the tem- 
ples, and the tombs in which the children of Israel were 
made to serve. "And they made their lives bitter with 
hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, and in all manner 
of service in the field: all their service, wherein they made 
them serve, was with rigour." Ex. i: 14- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 143 

The Lord willing, we shall continue our journey as far 
south as the second cataract and visit the land of Ethiopia, 
the Cush of the Bible. This will take us south of the 
Tropic of Cancer, and we shall spend some time at least 
in the torrid zone of Africa. The time allotted for the 
journey of " a thousand miles up the Nile" is one month, 
so that we shall not return to Cairo until the latter part of 
January, 1893. 

As we embark for a month's voyage on the broad wa- 
ters of the Nile let us give a brief sketch of the river. The 
Nile is said to be the longest river in the world. It rises 
under the equator, and, flowing northward, empties into 
the Mediterranean on the northern coast of Egypt. It has 
been explored for thirty-five hundred miles, and is about 
two-thirds of a mile wide at its widest place. It flows for 
nearly two thousand miles without an affluent. Although 
for all this distance it receives the help of no inflowing 
stream, making its way through a frightful desert and con- 
stantly losing by evaporation and the water taken out for 
irrigation in Nubia and Egypt, yet it empties into the Med- 
iterranean Sea an immense volume of water. 

The Nile is the life of Egypt. Without it the country 
would be but a desert waste. The inundation of the river 
is caused by the heavy rainfall in Abyssinia. At the first 
cataract the river begins to rise about the first of June, and 
a steady increase goes on until the middle of July. It then 
remains stationary for several weeks, and then increases 
until its greatest height is reached in October. It then be- 
gins to subside and falls steadily until June, when its low- 
est level is reached. The average rise of the river at the 
first cataract, where there is a Nilometer, a gauge made to 
measure the overflow, is forty-five feet; at Thebes, thirty- 
eight feet, and at Cairo, twenty-five feet. A rise of a few 



I44 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

feet more or less than the average is always attended with 
disaster. The former causes an overflow of the embank- 
ments made to control the water in Lower Egypt, and the 
latter results in a famine. When there is a "good Nile," 
as the Egyptians say, when it rises forty-five feet at Assu- 
an, there is general rejoicing all over the land, for it means 
a year of plenty for the farmers. 

It was on account of the continued low water in the 
Nile that the seven years of famine followed the seven 
years of plenty, caused by a "good Nile," of which we have 
such an interesting account in the Bible. It will be no- 
ticed that Pharaoh saw the kine come up from the river, 
so the years of plenty and of famine came from the river. 

The Nile is often mentioned in the Scriptures under 
various names. Jeremiah says, "Who is this that cometh 
up as a flood, whose waters are moved as the rivers? 
Egypt riseth up like a flood, and his waters are moved like 
the rivers." The prophet Amos also refers to the Nile as 

the flood of Egypt. 

Concerning the Nile Isaiah utters this remarkable 
prophecy, which has been literally fulfilled: "The Lord 
shall utterly destroy the tongue of the Egyptian sea; and 
with his mighty wind shall he shake his hand over the riv- 
er and shall smite it in the seven streams, and make men 
go over dryshod." Isa. 11:15. Originally the Nile divid- 
ed a few miles north of where Cairo now is and flowed into 
the sea by seven mouths. These seven streams, the proph- 
et says, shall be smitten, and smitten they have been. To- 
day the Nile has two artificially-constructed openings, Dami- 
etta and Rosetta, by which its waters pour into the sea. 
Five have been dried up and men go over dryshod. How 
the words of the prophet have been fulfilled! 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. I45 

Egypt, it has been said, is the gift of the Nile, and this 
saying is literally true. The annual overflow leaves the 
ground covered with a thin coating of mud which is ex- 
ceedingly fertile. Even before the water has fully reced- 
ed from the fields, the farmer sows the seed, thus literally 
casting his bread upon the waters, hoping for and receiv- 
ing a rich return after many days. The deposit of the riv- 
er, he says, is not mud, but gold. The ground needs no 
fertilizing, and but little labor is required to -prepare it for 
and put in the crops. A light pole is dragged over the 
fields and the seed is covered with mud. Two, and some- 
times three, abundant crops are raised in one year. When 
the waters recede the dry atmosphere takes up the mois- 
ture very rapidly, and water must be given to the growing 
crops. In order to accomplish this many canals are made 
to carry the water to the farmers from the river, and from 
the river and canals the water must be raised to the level 
of the fields. This requires an immense amount of labor, 
for, as the Nile recedes, the water must be raised from 
twenty to thirty feet. 

For the purpose of raising the water the sakkieh (a wa- 
ter-wheel) and the shaduf are principally used. The for- 
mer is a wheel, hung over the canal or a well dug near the 
river, with a double endless rope thrown over it, which 
reaches into the water. At regular intervals of about 
eighteen inches, earthen jars, holding about one gallon 
each, are securely fastened between the ropes. The wheel 
is geared to a long arm, to which oxen or camels are 
hitched. The wheel turns slowly, the jars go down empty 
on one side, come up full on the other and empty into a 
trough, from which the water is carried in a ditch to the 
fields. 



I4 6 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The shaduf is one of the oldest and most primitive 
methods of raising water. It was used in Egypt when 
Abraham first went to that country, and, without the slight- 
est change or modification, it is still used to-day. It was 
used by the children of Israel to raise water to the brick- 
yard, just as it is used by the brick-makers for the same 
purpose here now. Some of our readers will recall the old- 
fashioned well-sweep, now almost entirely superseded by 
the pump, -a long pole, so fastened to a beam that it 
swung up and down easily, at one end a heavy weight at- 
tached, at the other a rope and a bucket. This was pat- 
terned after the shaduf, which has been in use in Egypt 
for at least four thousand years. 

In the soft, steep banks of the Nile, or of the numer- 
ous canals which pass through the land, terraces are made 
about ten feet above each other. The lower one has a 
trench cut into it from the river. The water at the bot- 
tom of the trench is about two feet deep. On either side 
of the trench is a heavy post or a strong column built 
of sun-dried brick. The posts or columns stand about sue 
feet apart A cross-beam is firmly attached to the top of 
the pillars, and under this poles twelve feet long are at- 
tached four feet from the heavy end, by means of strong 
cords made of the fiber of the palm tree. The poles are 
tied so that they swing up and down easily. Behind, that 
is at the shorter end of the poles, the end farthest from 
the river, is fastened a heavy lump of clay, and from the 
other end hangs a rope or long palm twig, to the lower end 
of which is fastened a closely-woven basket, or a leathern 
bucket On top of the terrace a reservoir is formed of lay- 
ers of reeds and palm stems, well daubed with Nile mud 
An Arab stands on either side of the trench; by pulling 
down on the ropes the buckets are lowered and filled with 




The Shaduf. Raising Water in Egypt. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



149 



water. The clay balls on the shorter ends of the poles 
raise the full buckets, the laborer guiding them and emp- 
tying their contents into the reservoir. From this reservoir 
the water is raised by the same means into another, and an- 
other, the number depending on the height of the banks of 
the river. At one place we saw four shadufs, one above 
the other, with eight men raising water to the level of the 
fields. The full page photogravure will give our readers a 
good idea of the shaduf. 

Having reached the highest reservoir, the water flows 
by a ditch to a series of border channels, and is then con- 
ducted in smaller streams through the fields that are to be 
watered. When the river rises the terraces, columns and 
reservoirs are swept away, and new ones must be con- 
structed every year.* 

The men who work at these water-raising apparatuses 
are a class of their own. They are tall, straight and mus- 
cular fellows, and are called " fathers of the shaduf." They 
stand by the river bank, lowering and raising the buckets, 
singing in a low monotone a plaintive melody that sounds 
exceedingly mournful as it is borne to us over the waters 
of the Nile. It seems to speak of unremitting toil and op- 
pression. With but a simple cloth about their loins, the 
"fathers of the shaduf" look like bronze statues of Hercu- 
les in motion as they raise the life-giving waters of the Nile 
to the fields of corn and wheat. 

In the irrigation of his fields the Egyptian uses the 
same methods employed when Moses lived and wrote the 
books of the Pentateuch. He said: "For the land, whith- 
er thou goest in to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt, 
from whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, 
and wateredst it with thy foot, as a garden of herbs; but 

*Kingsley's "Egypt," 



I50 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

the land, whither ye go to possess it, is a land of hills and 
valleys, and drinketh water of the rain of heaven." Deut. 
11: 10, 11. After the water has been raised to the level of 
the fields, the Egyptian literally waters the land with his 
feet. Going into his little field or garden, as we have seen 
him do many times, often without hoe or other implement 
in his hand, he opens and closes the ditches with his feet, 
allowing the water to run here and there, and leading it to 
all parts of his field. We look upon the very method of 
irrigation described by Moses in the Scripture quoted. 
The conditions named by the inspired writer are all met 
here. The land is flat and level, and above the delta it 
drinketh not the "water of the rain of heaven." And yet, 
although Egypt is, practically speaking, without rain, it is 
deluged with an abundance of water each year. 

One of the questions which came up time and again 
in our travels in Egypt, is why, in these days of modern im- 
provement and advancement, better means for irrigating 
the land have not been introduced. Why should not steam 
be used to raise the water? The question is partly an- 
swered in the broken and rusted engines, pumps and water- 
pipes, which are to be seen on the banks of the river to-day. 

The former ruler of Egypt sought to lighten the heavy 
burdens of the farmer, and placed a number of steam 
pumps and engines on the banks of the Nile in Upper 
Egypt. They were used a short time, and then the natives 
fell back to the old method. The farmer did not like the 
new plan. It was easier than the old, but fuel must be 
gathered for the engine, and it got out of repair. He 
liked the old way of doing things the best. " Inshallah" 
(God willing), he said, "my fathers used the shaduf all the 
days of their lives. Who am I that I should depart from 
the ways of my fathers; am I wiser than they?" So the 



v 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



engines, pumps and water-pipes rust unused on the banks 
of the Nile, while, at the side of them, stand the " fathers 
of the shaduf," with the burning rays of the sun beating 
down on their naked backs, raising the water and singing 
their mournful song, as their fathers did forty centuries 
ago. It is a case of adherence to the customs of the fa- 
thers, more to be commended for its conservatism than for 
its wisdom. In Lower Egypt, and at some of the sugar 
plantations where the European influence is stronger, the 
steam engine is used in raising water from the Nile. 

We have been particularly struck, as we have traveled 
up the Nile, with the condition of the people. There is 
much hard work and oppression, but they seem to be well 
fed and contented, even happy, in their lot. Miss Marti- 
neau says: " I was agreeably surprised, in my travels 
throughout Egypt, by the appearance of the people. 
About the dirt there can be no doubt, the dirt of the dwell- 
ings and the diseases which proceed from a want of cleanli- 
ness; but the people appeared to us to be sleek, well fed 
and cheerful. I am not sure I saw an ill-fed person in all 
Egypt. There are hardships enough of other kinds, abun- 
dance of misery to sadden the heart of the traveler; but 
not that, so far as we saw, of want of food. I am told, and 
no doubt truly, that this is owing to the law of the Koran, 
by which every man is bound to share what he has, even 
to the last mouthful, with his brother in need." If the 
same rule of distribution were observed all over the world, 
there would be no hungry people, for there is enough for 
all and to spare. 

And now we are steaming up the Nile, which " flows 
through old, hushed Egypt and its sands, like some grave, 
mighty thought, threading a dream." While we have been 
writing about river, water-wheel and shaduf, we have 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

reached our first stopping-place. Firmly moored to the 
shore is a large flatboat, on which is painted in large let- 
ters the name Bedrachin. It is the landing-place at the 
ruins of Memphis, the ancient capital of Lower Egypt. 

A hundred men and boys are on the shore, with near- 
ly as many donkeys. As there are at least three donkeys 
for every passenger we expect a lively time, and are not 
disappointed. No sooner have we stepped ashore than we 
are surrounded by the yelling crowd, each solicitous that 
we shall mount his donkey. The din and confusion are 
simply indescribable. We try to take a stand and see what 
is going on, but it is useless; we are pulled and shoved by 
the crowd, until at last, seeing a good-sized animal, we 
make a rush for him and in a few minutes are mounted and 
away from the yelling crowd. The Elder has also succeed- 
ed in mounting, and we start for a long ride to Memphis 
and across the desert to Sakkara and the tombs of the sa- 
cred Apis, known as the Serapeum. 

The Hebrew name for the ancient Egyptian city of 
Men-Nefrew (Pyramid City), known to us as Memphis, was 
Noph, and except in Hosea 9: 6, where it is called Mem- 
phis, the former name is applied to it in the Bible. It was 
a flourishing city when the Great Pyramid was built, and 
when Joseph was taken from the prison to the palace of 
Pharaoh to interpret the dreams of the ruler of Egypt he 
passed through the streets of that city. The early history 
is lost in the dim ages of the past, and we have not space 
to speak of the more recent records. Memphis, suffice it 
to say, is as old as the history of the country of which it was 
for so many centuries the proud capital. 

Mounted on our trusty little donkeys, we are now 
ready for a ride to explore the ruins of Noph, to verify the 
truth of the Bible, for it says; "Noph shall be waste and 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



153 



desolate without an inhabitant." Above us is the cloudless 
sky, from which the sun shines even in the middle of win- 
ter with force enough to make a sunshade quite desirable. 
The air is very clear, so that the most distant objects seem 
very near. The Great Pyramid, which stood like a sentinel 
over Memphis, looms up in the distance. Leaving the riv- 
er, the road leads through fields of growing grain. The 
dark green color and rank growth tell of the richness of the 
soil. Here and there the valley is interspersed with small 
groves of stately palms. We ride beneath them, glad for 
the little shade they afford. A short distance from the riv- 
er we are met by a score or more of scantily-clothed Arab 
children, who are clamorous for backsheesh. Then we en- 
ter and ride through a village composed of flat-roofed, one- 
story houses, built of sun-dried brick. On top of the hous- 
es are built small, round towers with dome-shaped roofs. 
Many holes are cut into the towers. They are the pigeon 
houses. Our dragoman told us that every time a man took 
a new wife he built or added several new pigeon towers to 
his house in honor of the event. In some places the pig- 
eon towers are the largest part of the house, and they give 
the towns of Upper Egypt a peculiar appearance. 

The streets of the village or town are narrow and wind- 
ing, and many of them end abruptly at the door of a house. 
On either side of the streets only bare mud walls are ob- 
served. Windows and window-glass are not often seen. 
The door serves as an opening at which to go in and out, 
and to admit light. Chimneys are not seen, as fires are sel- 
dom lighted in the house. The climate is dry and warm, 
and fire is not needed. Cooking is usually done outside of 
the houses. As rain seldom falls here the sun-dried brick 
last for centuries. One of the heavy, dashing rains, lasting 
for several days, which we often have at home, would re- 



!jj4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

duce one of the Egyptian towns to a mud heap in a very 
short time. 

Leaving the village we approach the line of the desert, 
and here is to be seen a colossal statue of Rameses II, the 
Pharaoh who oppressed Israel. It is made of fine, hard 
limestone, and is forty-two feet in height. Budge says it is 
probably one of the statues which stood in front of the 
Temple of Ptah, mentioned by Herodotus and Diodorus. 
It bears in Egyptian characters the name of Rameses II, 
and with another of the same kind, recently discovered a 
short distance away, we have all that has been uncovered 
of the City of Memphis. At one time it was thirteen miles 
in circumference, now its former site is almost wholly cov- 
ered with sand. It is one of the buried cities of the Bible. 

The statue, referred to in the preceding paragraph, and 
of which our engraving is an exact reproduction, must have 
been magnificent before it was broken and mutilated. The 
features are finely cut and the face is Egyptian. Originally 
the statue was fifty feet high, and was one of a pair which 
stood in front of the temple, the other having recently been 
discovered in the Nile mud. We stood some time looking 
at this defaced, mutilated, fallen statue of the greatest of 
all the Pharaohs, under whose reign Israel was oppressed 
and Moses fled away from Egypt, " choosing rather to suf- 
fer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the 
pleasures of sin for a season." How appropriately the 
words of Isaiah apply to the mighty conqueror, " They that 
see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, 
saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, that 
did shake kingdoms; that made the world as a wilderness, 
and destroyed the cities thereof; that opened not the house 
of his prisoners? All the kings of the nations, even all of 
them, lie in glory, every one in his own house. But thou 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 1 57 

art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch, and as 
the raiment of those that are slain, thrust through with a 
sword, that go down to the stones of the pit; as a carcase 
trodden under feet." Isa. 14: 16-19. 

We ride over the sand that partly covers the site of an- 
cient Memphis, passing the Arab village of Mitrahenny and 
going on to Sakkara where the dead of Noph were buried. 
On the way men and boys meet us, offering for sale lamps, 
scarabs (the sacred beetle of ancient Egypt) and other an- 
tiquities, some taken from the tombs, others manufactured 
at Cairo. One held up the mummified hand of an ancient 
Memphite, offering to sell it for two shillings, saying: 
" Him very good mummy hand." 

Reaching the tombs we look about us. There is sand 
everywhere. Before us is the great desert sand-waste, part 
of which we have just passed over. The eddies of the wind 
carry the yellow and white sand into ridge-like drifts, as 
snow is drifted on our western prairies. The lifeless, inter- 
minable desert reflects with lurid glare the cloudless blue 
sky. Everywhere around and about us is the depth of si- 
lence and desolation. It is the burial-place of a dead na- 
tion, covered with the drifting sands of the desert. " We 
were standing among the tombs of those who died four 
thousand years ago." 

And this sandy waste has once been the site of a popu- 
lous city, the capital of Egypt. Here Moses lived as the 
son of Pharaoh's daughter. Here the oppressor of Israel 
had his court, and here he reigned sixty-seven years. Here 
six hundred years before Christ, long before Alexandria 
was founded, the city of Noph flourished, and Jeremiah 
wrote these words concerning the great city, "Noph 
shall be waste and desolate." Could a prophecy be more 
literally fulfilled? Waste and desolation are written all 



I58 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

over the site of ancient Memphis. " And without an inhab- 
itant." You may search for an inhabitant in this sandy 
waste, but you will find none. You will meet the descend- 
ants of the ancient Egyptians as you ride across the desert, 
but their dwelling-place is at Bedrachin, on the banks of 
the Nile. The words of the prophet of God have come to 
pass to the very letter. 

The tombs of the wealthy class of the ancient Egyp- 
tians were cut in the living rock. Great sums of money 
were expended in this way, the size of the tomb depending 
upon the wealth and importance of the personage for whom 
it was made. The tombs were made during the lifetime of 
those who were to occupy them after death. Here, not in 
the larger chambers of the tombs, but in a secret chamber, 
the entrance to which was carefully hid, the body, after 
having been carefully embalmed, was laid away to rest. 
The tombs are interesting because they contain the name 
and often a sketch of the life of the owner. The walls are 
painted with scenes from the life of the ancient Egyptians, 
and contain many hieroglyphics, which have been read and 
translated, so that we can read them and know about the 
lives and history of these remarkable people. 

Singularly enough, as it may seem, the largest tombs at 
Sakkara are known as the Serapeum, in which, after they 
had been carefully embalmed, the sacred bulls of Apis were 
buried. " Living, these animals were worshiped in a mag- 
nificent temple in- Memphis; dead, they were buried in the 
vaults at Sakkara." We go down into these rock-cut 
tombs with a trusty guide, and candles and torches to light 
our way. It is a huge, vaulted tunnel, divided into three 
parts, one of which is twelve hundred feet long, and anoth- 
er one-half that length. From either side of the tunnel 
chambers are made, in the center of which are ponderous 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



159 



granite coffins thirteen feet long, eight feet wide, and 
twelve feet deep. We saw twenty-four of these huge sar- 
cophagi, cut from a single block of red granite and very 
highly polished. A slab of the same material, of great 
weight, was placed on top of the sarcophagus, closing it 
like a lid. The Khedive of Egypt was anxious to remove 




Interior of o?ie of the Vaulted Galleries in the Serapeum 
at Sakkara. 



one of the granite coffins and place it in the modern muse- 
um at Cairo. His men succeeded in removing it from its 
chamber into the vaulted passage, but could take it no fur- 
ther; the inclined plane which leads to the mouth of the 
tunnel was an insuperable barrier. And yet the ancient 
Egyptians transported hundreds of these huge coffins from 
Syene, where the quarries are located, a distance of six 
hundred miles, and placed them in these chambers. In 



160 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

these great granite coffins the bodies of the sacred animals 
were placed for burial. 

We grope around in the Egyptian darkness of the sub- 
terranean tunnels and chambers. Our torches and candles 
only make the gloom and darkness apparent. Thousands 
of great bats, disturbed in their slumbers, flit about our 
heads, and make a peculiar noise like the gnashing of teeth. 
The air is close and warm, and the odor emitted by the 
bats is almost unendurable. Our dim candles and torches 
cast great, indistinct shadows on the rocky walls. It is a 
strange, weird place in which we are wandering. Our 
guide (he is called a dragoman here) has a quantity of mag- 
nesium wire, which burns with brilliancy equal to the elec- 
tric light. By burning wire in the chambers we are enabled 
to note every detail of the interior of the rooms, and the 
workmanship of the sarcophagi. On the walls are number- 
less inscriptions with dates which have an important bear- 
ing on the chronology of Egyptian history. They also 
touch the chronology of the Bible. After what seems to 
us a long time in the stifling atmosphere of the vaults, we 
grope our way to the entrance, glad to breathe the fresh, 
pure air of heaven again. 

The pomp and splendor with which the worship of 
Apis was surrounded, the care taken of his dead body, and 
the worship of the sacred ox at Heliopolis, only a short 
distance from Memphis, will help us to understand more 
fully the cause of the apostasy of Israel in the wilderness. 
When they demanded of Aaron that he should make them 
a god, a molten calf was made, the god Apis, and when it 
was set up the people said: " These be thy gods, O Israel, 
which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." Ex. 32: 
4. They had seen divine honors paid to the calf so many 
times in Egypt, even by Pharaoh himself, they had worked 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



161 



so long in the quarries at Syene where the coffins of Apis 
were made, that they had come to look upon the animal as 
sacred. And at Sinai, where Moses left them for only a 
few days, their hearts went back to the gods of Egypt and 
they " corrupted themselves, turning aside out of the way 
which the Lord commanded them." 

Here is a lesson which teaches the truth of another 
Scripture, which says: " Evil communications corrupt good 
manners." Israel, in this long intercourse with the people 
of Egypt, became corrupted with idolatry, of which they 
were cured only after centuries of hard experience and se- 
vere punishment. 

At Sakkara we also visit the temple of Tih, in which 
are to be seen some of the best preserved frescoes in 
Egypt. The pictures in bright colors give us an insight 
into the home life and the customs of the ancient Egyp- 
tians. It is remarkable how well the colors have been pre- 
served. They are as bright as when they were spread on 
the walls by the Egyptian artists thousands of years ago. 

Around about Sakkara are eleven small pyramids. 
The one known as the Step Pyramid is the most interest- 
ing. It consists of six stages or steps, ranging in height 
from twenty-nine to thirty-eight feet. Each of the steps is 
six and a half feet wide. The perpendicular height is one 
hundred and ninety-seven feet. 

Some authorities are of the opinion that the Step 
Pyramid is older than Cheops. The interior contains a 
number of passages and chambers. Mariette, after a care- 
ful examination of the chambers, was led to conclude that 
this pyramid had once contained the tombs of Apis. 

On our return to the steamer we secure some of the 
antiquities offered for sale by the wayside venders. We 
have a lamp that was probably used four thousand years 



I 



t 5 2 wanderings in bible lands. 

ago, with several stone-cut scarabs nearly as old, which we 

hope to bring home with us. 

The day has been one of hard work, but of intense in- 
terest. The shades of evening are gathering around us as 




The Step Pyramid at Sakkara. 

we recross the site of ancient Memphis. Our thoughts are 
carried back to the time when Moses and Aaron went be- 
fore Pharaoh and demanded that he should let Israel go. 
" In the city, now buried beneath mouldering heaps and 
desert sand, the faithful and fearless leader braved the 
wrath of the King; for he endured, as seeing H.m who is 
invisible This was the spot where Pharaoh rose up in the 
night he and all his servants, and all the Egyptians; and 
there was a great cry in Egypt; for there was not a house 
where there was not one dead! Our thoughts pass away 
from the palaces, smitten with this sudden and sore be- 
reavement, to the homes of the enslaved race, waiting se- 
curely for the signal to depart, whilst through faith they 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 163 

'kept the passover, and the sprinkling of blood, lest He 
that destroyed the first born should touch them.' Great as 
was the historical importance of this event, seeing that it 
was the birth of a nation, it gains yet deeper significance in 
the fact that it was a type of the great Antitype: 4 For even 
Christ our passover is sacrificed for us.' "* 

We are again on our way southward. The sun, in full- 
orbed glory, has sunk behind the western desert, the moon, 
nearly full, with pale light, rises in the heavens. Evenings 
like this we never see in our moist, northern climates. The 
lines of Addison have a new meaning when read on such an 
evening as this: 

" Soon as the evening shades prevail, 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale. 
And, nightly, to the listening earth, 
Repeats the story of her birth; 
Whilst all the stars that round her burn, 
And all the planets in their turn, 
Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
And spread the truth from pole to pole." 

So passed our first day on the Nile. Can it ever be 
forgotten ? 



•Manning, " Land of the Pharaohs.' 1 



CHAPTER IX. 




Nile Scenes.-Our Pilot. -The Natives and their Villages - Death 
and Burial. -The School and the Schoolmaster.- The Doom 
Palm. -The Pafiyrus Reed. -Fulfillment of Prophecy. 

ERE we to write the record of each day's experi- 
ence and impressions, as we journey up and down 
in this wonderland of the Nile, volumes would not 
contain all that might be written. Our journey up the 
river is made almost entirely by daylight. Owing to the 
shifting channel and the deposit of mud, navigation is 
rendered somewhat difficult, and the Nile pilots prefer to 
run their boats by the light of the sun. At the bow of the 
boat stands an Arab with a long pole in his hands. Every 
few minutes he thrusts it into the water to ascertain its 
depth which he reports to the pilot by calling out in a loud 
voice' Notwithstanding all this precaution, our steamer 
was run on hidden mudbars several times, and had to be 
backed off and a different course taken. 

South of Cairo, until Assuan and the first cataract are 
reached, the Nile flows through an ever widening and nar- 
rowing valley of rich, arable land. At places the valley is 
but a few yards wide, at others the desert stretches out on 
either side of the river, and the valley widens to a number 
of miles The banks of the river thus present a constantly 
changing, a varying landscape. The lights and shades on 
the Libyan Mountains, the desert sand, and the green val- 
ley, are a study for an artist. Innumerable groves of great, 

164* 



Our Pilot on the Nile. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. I6/ 7 

stately palms wave their plume-like branches in the air, 
giving an oriental cast to the scene. On either shore the 
narrow valley is covered with growing crops of maize, 
wheat, lentils and beans; even to the very water's edge. 

Then there are the villages of the natives, built on the 
edge of the sandy desert, so that all the land covered by 
the overflow of the river may be farmed. We went into a 
number of the villages and found them entirely devoid of 
anything like cleanliness or comfort. Vermin of all kinds 
abound. The houses are mere mud huts, and are without 
furniture. One can scarcely imagine a condition so com- 
fortless as that of the fellah of Egypt, as the laborer is 
called. His lot is one of incessant toil, which continues as 
long as life lasts. " He dies where he was born, after pass- 
ing through a life of intolerable hardships, and is buried in 
the sands of the desert not far from his humble home." 

At Beni Hassan we rode across the plain to visit the 
rock-cut tombs. On the way we passed a house in which 
one of the inmates had just died. Long before we reached 
the house we heard the cry of the mourners, and the sad 
sound was borne to our ears long after we had passed the 
place. Four hours later, on our return, the body had been 
buried in a hastily-made grave in the sands of the desert. 
Again at Assuan, when walking through the streets with 
our dragoman, we came to a house from which the spirit of 
the owner had just taken its flight to the great unknown 
world. A score or more of men were moving slowly and 
with dignity about the street in front of the house, giving- 
vent to their feelings of sorrow in a sad, mournful cry. 
Occasionally one and then another would take up the skirt 
of his outer garment and rend it, thereby manifesting more 
strongly the depth of his grief. These were the friends and 
relatives of the dead man who had come to mourn over his 



,gg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

departure. Among them was a young woman, whose voice 
was heard above the rest as she cried out in her grief. She 
was the daughter of the dead man, and presented the very 
picture of sorrow, her hair was unloosed, her head and face 
were uncovered; she cried out, as the interpreter told us, 
"Oh my father! my father!! the stay and support of my 
life- my father is dead; my father is dead." She also rent 
her' garments in the abandon of her grief. We continued 
our walk, but the voice of the girl whose father was dead 
rang in our ears. The whole scene recalled the Scripture, 
"because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners 
go about the streets." 

The practice of rending the clothing as a sign of sor- 
row and great grief is as common in the East to-day as it 
was in Bible times. When Aaron's sons fell before the al- 
tar because they offered strange fire, Moses commanded 
Aaron and his kinsmen not to uncover their heads nor rend 
their clothes* Van Lennep says, however, that care is 
taken not to injure the garment by this operation. The un- 
dertaker who has charge of every detail procures the 
mourners and furnishes the robes they wear. Before the 
funeral procession starts he goes to each mourner and care- 
fully rips the central seam of his kaftan or robe, three or 
four inches down the breast.f The mourner increases the 
rent thus made very slightly, and afterward it is carefully 
repaired, to be rent again when occasion requires its use. 

In Cairo we saw a number of funeral processions of the 
wealthy people. A large number of mourners were m at- 
tendance, the number depending on the wealth of the be- 
reaved family. They moved slowly through the streets, 
following the hearse which conveyed the dead to the tomb. 

*Lev. 10 : 6. 

tVan Lennep, "Bible Lands," page C87. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



169 



and were followed by the relatives and friends in carriages. 
They, cried out in mourning and made much show of sor- 
row. They rent their garments, but in a careful manner, so 
that they might easily be repaired. It could be seen that 
they made a business of mourning, and to us it all seemed 
like an empty, hollow mockery, not to be compared with 
the genuine sorrow and real grief of the poor girl whom we 
saw and heard mourning for her father in the street at 
Assuan. 

In some instances the mourners take off their outer 
garments and replace them with coarse, heavy sackcloth, 
and occasionally throw dust and ashes on their heads as a 
sign of their grief. This, too, is an old Bible custom: "And 
Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, 
and mourned for his son many days." Gen. 37: 34. When 
Job's friends came to him and knew him not when they saw 
him, "they lifted up their voice, and wept; and they rent 
every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads 
toward heaven." Job 2: 12. 

Mr. Lane in his valuable work gives the following very 
accurate description of a modern funeral procession: "The 
first persons in the procession are six or more poor men 
called Yemeneeh, mostly blind, who proceed two and two, 
or three and three together. Walking at moderate pace, or 
rather slowly, they chant in melancholy tone the profession 
of faith, or sometimes other words. They are followed by 
some male relations and friends of the deceased, and in 
many cases by two or more persons of some sect of the 
Dervishes, having the flags of the order. Next follow 
three or four schoolboys bearing a copy of the Koran (the 
Mohammedan Bible) placed upon a kind of desk formed 
of palm-sticks, and covered over generally with an embroid- 
ered kerchief. These boys chant in a higher and livelier 



IfO WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

voice than the Yemeneeh, usually some words of a poem 
descriptive of the events of the last day, the judgment, etc., 
commencing, 

" « I assert the absolute glory of Him who createth whatever hath form, 
And reduceth his servants by death: 

Who bringeth to nought all His creatures, with mankind; 

They shall all lie in the graves: 

The absolute glory of the Lord of the East, 

The absolute glory of the Lord of the West, 

The absolute glory of the Illuminator of the two lights; 

The sun, to wit, and the moon; 

His absolute glory! how bountiful is he! ' " 

The schoolboys immediately precede the coffin, which 
is borne head foremost. Three or four friends of the de- 
ceased usually carry it for a short distance; then three or 
four other friends, who are in like manner relieved. Be- 
hind the bier walk the female mourners; sometimes a group 
of more than a dozen or twenty, with their hair disheveled, 
though generally concealed by a head veil, crying and 
shrieking; and often the hired mourners accompany them, 
celebrating the praises of the deceased. Among the wom- 
en the relations and the domestics of the deceased are dis- 
tinguished by a strip of linen, or cotton stuff, or muslin, 
generally blue, bound around the head and tied in a single 
knot behind, the ends hanging down a few inches. Each 
of these also carries a handkerchief, usually dyed blue, 
which she sometimes holds over her shoulders, and at 
other times twirls with both hands over her head or before 
her face. The cries of the women, the lively chanting of 
the youths and the deep tones of the Yemeneeh compose 
a strange discord. 

I have seen mourning women of the lower classes fol- 
lowing a bier, having their faces— which were bare— and 
their head-coverings and bosoms besmeared with mud. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



171 



The funeral procession of a man of wealth, or of the 
middle classes, is sometimes preceded by three or four or 
more camels, bearing- bread and water to give to the poor 
at the tomb, and is composed of a more numerous and va- 
ried assemblage of persons. In this, besides the persons 
already mentioned, the led horses of the bearers, if men of 
rank, often follow the bier; and a buffalo, to be sacrificed 
at the tomb, where its flesh is to be distributed to the poor, 
closes the procession.* 

Among the poor people who dwell along the banks of 
the Nile the funeral rites are very simple. As soon as 
death comes the body is prepared for the grave with much 
haste, and if not too late the burial takes place the same 
day. If one dies before the middle of the afternoon the 
body is never kept until the next day. It is carefully 
washed and wrapped in a winding sheet; cotton is placed in 
the mouth, the ears, the nostrils, and under the arms. It is 
then placed in a coffin and raised to the shoulders of four 
men, who carry it to the grave. The friends and relatives 
follow on foot, making up the funeral procession. The 
whole multitude, be it large or small, " lift up their voices 
and weep." We often saw these mourning processions in 
Egypt, and there is something unutterably sad about it 'all. 

The grave is dug a few feet deep, and then — at the 
bottom and side — a niche is made in which the body is 
placed in its winding sheet, coffinless. If it has been car- 
ried to the grave in a coffin, the body is taken out and 
placed in the ground as before described. The same coffin 
is used to convey other bodies to the grave, and serves the 
purpose of a hearse. The niche keeps the earth from fall- 
ing on the body when the grave is filled. Small stones are 
placed at the head and foot of the little mound, and the 

*Lane's " Modern Egyptians," II, page 294. 



!72 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

mourners depart from the tomb. South of Wady Haifa 
we saw many graves, the tops of which were covered with 
beautiful agate pebbles which abound there in the desert, 
and which have been beautifully polished by the sands that 
have blown over them. 

On either side of the river the shaduf and the sakkieh 
are to be seen in great numbers. The song of the " fathers 
of the shaduf," as they lift the water from the river to the 
fields, is constantly borne to us across the waters of the 
Nile. Then, too, the creaking noise of the water-wheels is 
heard day and night; for at this season of the year the 
growing crops must have water. The oxen and driver are 
changed, and the wheel goes on with its creaking noise. It 
is loud enough at places to keep us awake at night, and 
leads us to the conclusion that oil is a stranger to the 
sakkieh. 

Another method of lifting water from the Nile is occa- 
sionally seen. Two men standing by the side of the river 
have two ropes with a water-tight basket fastened in the 
center. Taking the opposite ends of the ropes in their 
hands and facing each other, they dip the basket into the 
water, filling it and then, with a swinging motion of the 
ropes, dextrously throwing the water into the reservoir on 
the banks. This method is resorted to only where the 
banks of the stream are low; it is much more laborious than 
working the shaduf. 

Looking over the fields of growing wheat we notice the 
farmers sowing dust on the grain, much the same as we 
used to sow plaster on the clover fields in Maryland thirty- 
five years ago. It is thought here that it is helpful to the 
crops. When we visited the ruined temples in Upper 
Egypt and Nubia, we found men and women busily en- 
gaged in digging up the earth about the temples. They 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. I73 

then sifted it to remove the broken crockery and pieces of 
stone. After completing this process, the dust was carried 
to the fields in sacks and baskets, on the backs of donkeys 
and camels, and scattered over the growing grain. Those 
who do this kind of work are literally covered with dust, 
and cannot be said to present a cleanly appearance. 

At Kalabshi one of the ladies of our party gave to a 
group of Arab women, who were carrying water in jars on 
their heads, a short talk on keeping themselves cleaner; 
she told them they ought to wash their gowns oftener. 
The women listened attentively to her words, through the 
interpreter, and then one of them said, " You go in the 
fields every day, spread dust on the grain, carry water-jar 
on your head from river, hoe in ground, pull weeds, work 
all day, you not so clean either; you clean, you no work." 
The answer, it seemed to us, fit remarkably well. The pic- 
ture of the fashionably-dressed woman, whose jeweled 
hands never knew toil, brought a smile to the face of her 
friends, and the Arab women went on their way, bearing 
their burdens and laughing as they went. 

One of the very common scenes along the Nile is that 
of women coming down to the banks of the stream with 
water-jars on their heads. Wading into the river the face 
and hands of the water-carriers are washed, then the jars 
are washed and rinsed, outside and inside, and filled 
with water. The jars hold from three to five gallons each. 
After being filled they are lifted to the top of the heads of 
the women, where they are carefully poised, and are thus 
carried to the village. It is quite a singular sight to see a 
group of women and girls with water-jars poised on their 
heads. The artist caught such a group with his camera at 
one of the villages along the Nile and we give it to our 
readers on page 175. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

In all the villages along the river one meets the village 
schoolmaster; he is an important personage; he can recite 
the Koran (the Mohammedan Bible) from memory, and this 
is his principal qualification. As a rule he can write the 
Arabic and has a limited knowledge of figures, but as arith- 
metic is not taught in the village school this knowledge is 
considered superfluous. The school-room is without win- 
dows, the door admitting the light; and the boys sit on the 
earthen floor. The teacher sitting in front of them repeats 
verses of the Koran and each boy follows him, repeating 
the words which are meaningless to them. Month after 
month they keep up this parrot-like work, and when they 
can recite the principal parts of the book from memory 
their education is finished and they are ready to graduate. 

Mr. Lane gives the following illustration of the igno- 
rance and shrewdness of the native school-teacher. He 
says: "I was lately told of a man who could neither read 
nor write, succeeding to the office of a schoolmaster in my 
neighborhood. Being able to recite the whole of the Ko- 
ran, he could hear the boys repeat their lessons; to write 
them, he employed the ' areef ' (or head boy in the school), 
pretending that his eyes were weak. A few days after he 
had taken this upon himself, a poor woman brought a let- 
ter for him to read to her from her son who had gone on a 
pilgrimage; the fikee pretended to read it, but said nothing, 
and the woman, inferring from his silence that the letter 
contained bad news, said to him, < Shall I shriek? ' he an- 
swered, 'Yes.' 'Shall I tear my clothes?' she asked; he 
replied', 'Yes.' So the poor woman returned to her home, 
and with her household performed the lamentations and 
other ceremonies usual on the occasion of death. Not 
many days after this the son arrived, and she asked him 
what he could mean by causing a letter to be written stat- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



177 



ing that he was dead? He explained the contents of the 
letter, and she went to the schoolmaster and begged him to 
inform her why he told her to shriek and tear her clothes, 
since the letter was to tell her that her son was well and was 
coming home. Not at all abashed, he said, ' God knows 
futurity; how could I know that your son would arrive in 
safety? It was better that you should think him dead than 
to be led to expect to see him and be disappointed.' Some 
persons who were sitting with him praised his wisdom, ex- 
claiming, ' Truly our new fikee is a man of unusual judg- 
ment;' and for a little while he found that he had raised 
his reputation by his blunder." 

Birds along the river are very plentiful and quite tame. 
The stork, the white heron, pelicans, wild geese, ducks, 
hawks, pigeons, and the universal English sparrow abound. 
Some of them injure the crops. The boys who lead the 
flocks of sheep to pasture are armed with slings, and part 
of their duty is to drive the birds from the grain fields. 
They acquire great dexterity in the use of the sling, and 
can bring down a bird at a long distance. It reminded us 
of the lad who tended the flocks on the fields of Bethle- 
hem. He doubtless became familiar with the use of the 
sling, just as these Egyptian lads do. At least he had a 
steady aim and a strong arm when he felled Goliath, the 
champion of the Philistines. The stork and the white her- 
on are as tame as the domestic fowls at home. The na- 
tives, as a rule, are exceedingly kind to birds and animals. 
The Arabs will share their last mouthful with their horses, 
and the faithful horse often finds shelter in the tent of his 
master. It is much to the credit of these people that a so- 
ciety for the prevention of cruelty to animals is not needed 
here, and to the discredit of our people that such a society 
finds so much to do among us. 



I78 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The palm is the principal tree to be seen on the Nile. 
Sycamores and acacias are seen at some places, but the palm 
is the tree of Egypt. It bears an abundant crop of dates, 
which are highly nutritious and form an important part of 
the food supply of the inhabitants. The doom palm pro- 
duces a fruit as large as a medium-sized orange, but irregu- 
lar in shape, of a yellowish color, and is said to taste like 
gingerbread. The fruit of the doom palm was often placed 
in the tombs with the dead. In the museum at Cairo we 
saw some which had been taken out of the tomb of one of 
■he Pharaohs who died before the birth of Moses; and al- 
though they were about thirty-five hundred years old they 
looked very much like the specimen we bought from an 
Arab at Assiut. 

In ancient times the lotus and papyrus reed were the 
most common plants in Egypt. The lotus was the national 
flower, and it may be seen in all the monuments and tem- 
ples. The papyrus, the' leaves of which were used for 
writing, also abounded on the banks of the Nile. It was 
seen all along the banks of the river, especially in Lower 
Egypt. Singularly enough, this plant has entirely disap- 
peared. It is said that a few years ago a traveler reported 
having seen a single stalk of papyrus in the delta, but this 
is doubted. The closest search was made and failed to re- 
veal a single specimen of this once common water plant. 

It may not be generally known that the paper reed or 
papyrus was made the subject of prophecy, and yet it is 
true. Isaiah says: "And they shall turn the rivers far 
away; and the brooks of defence shall be emptied and 
dried up: the reeds and flags shall wither. The paper reeds 
by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks, and everything 
sown by the brooks, shall wither, be driven away, and be 
no more." Isa. 19: 6, 7. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



179 



The paper reed, the reeds and the flag have withered, 
have been driven away, and are no more. Thus the Word 
of the Lord, spoken by the prophet, has been literally ful- 
filled, and the paper reed, which was at one time so abun- 
dant here and was so important to the inhabitants of an- 
cient Egypt (for all their books, contracts, deeds and other 
documents were written on the leaves of this plant), has 
entirely disappeared from the country. Singularly enough, 
too, the only place where it is found in the East is in the 
Land of Palestine. Nine years ago we found the paper 
reed growing abundantly north of the Sea of Galilee. 
Why, in the natural course of things, should the papyrus 
become extinct in Egypt, its home, and yet continue to 
grow so abundantly and luxuriantly in the Holy Land? 
Our answer to the question is found in the prophecy of 
Isaiah. 



CHAPTER X. 




Temples and Tombs.-Beni Hassan. -Immortality of the SouL-Em- 
balming.-Jaeob and Joseph Embalmed.- An ^Anctent Funeral 
Procession.-Rock-eut Tombs at Beni Hassan.-The Chamber of the 
Dead.-The Tomb ofAmeni.-Allusion to the Famine. 

N our way up the Nile we stop at a number of 
places to explore and inspect ancient temples and 
tombs, constructed at least three thousand years 
. The temples, which tell the story of ancient Egypt's 
greatness, are, with few exceptions, great masses of ruins 
A few of them, having been covered with the drifting sand 
of the desert and but recently excavated, are stdl in a re- 
markable state of preservation. The tombs, having been 
cut into the solid rock of the mountain side, remain unto 
this day, except as they have been defaced by human hands 
and robbed of mummies, coffins and funerary offerings. 

After leaving Memphis we pass several places of inter- 
est which will be referred to in the succeeding chapter, and 
stop at Beni Hassan. Here there are a number of very in- 
teresting rock-cut tombs. In order to understand fully the 
ancient Egyptian's motive in spending so much time and 
money on his burial-place, it will be necessary to know 
something of his belief as to the future of the body. 

Briefly, then, although shrouded by innumerable super- 
stitions, the ancient Egyptian believed that after the lapse 
of many thousand years the soul would again return to and 
inhabit the body. When it is known that they believed 
that the soul entered successively into a phoenix, a heron, a 



180 



jg 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

swallow, a snake, a crocodile, and other animals, some idea 
of the superstition of the Egyptians will be apparent. But 
running through this mass of absurdities was the faint light 
of the immortality of the soul. After all its wanderings 
and struggles, they believed it would live in the body 
again. 

It might be interesting to inquire whence the ancient 
Egyptians had their faint knowledge of the immortality of 
the soul. It was far from the grand light and immortality 
revealed in the Gospel, but yet there was in it a ray of light 
and truth. We believe it came to them from God. We 
know that he, in the olden time, made himself known to the 
people at " sundry times and in divers manners." We can- 
not now follow this thought further. 

Believing, then, that at some remote period the soul 
would live again, not in a new body, but in the same old 
body it dwelt in before death, the chief concern of the an- 
cient Egyptian was to preserve the body after death, so 
that, when the soul returned, it would find the body ready 
for its reception. Hence the art of embalming the body 
was carried to such a high degree of perfection that even 
the features of the face have been well preserved for more 
than three thousand years. This is also the key to the 
motive which led them to spend so much time and money 
on their tombs. The Pharaohs, the priests, and the wealthy 
spent immense sums of money in cutting their tombs into 
the living rock and making them strong and secure. In 
these tombs, not in the large chambers or halls, but in a se- 
cret crypt, the existence of which was known to only a few 
of the nearest relatives and the high priest, the body was 
hid away. W r ith it were placed various kinds of food, rai- 
ment, and articles for the toilet. In the tomb, or rather 
with the body of the Pharaoh of the oppression, there were 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 183 

found, among other things, several hams of mutton, some 
geese (these had been embalmed), date palms, wheat, 
maize, lentils, beans, wine, oil, clothing, mirrors and other 
articles for the toilet; also books written on papyrus. We 
had the opportunity of seeing and examining these articles, 
and found them in a remarkable state of preservation. The 
grain, if planted, will grow, having retained the germ of life 
for all these centuries. The doom palms looked very much 
like those we found along the Nile on our trip southward. 
It is owing to this custom of placing so many articles in 
the tombs with the dead that to-day we know so much 
about the habits, customs, modes of life, etc., of the ancient 
Egyptians. 

As before stated, the art of embalming grew out of a 
belief in the immortality of the soul. In Bible times it was 
the universal custom to embalm the bodies of the dead. 
"And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to 
embalm his father: and the physicians embalmed Israel. 
And forty days were fulfilled for him; for so are fulfilled 
the days of those which are embalmed: and the Egyptians 
mourned for him threescore and ten days." Gen. 50: 2, 3. 
And when Joseph died years afterwards "they embalmed 
him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt." Gen. 50: 26. 

The natural conditions in Egypt were conducive to the 
preservation of the body after death. Without rainfall and 
with a very dry atmosphere, it was not a difficult matter to 
arrest decomposition, and the bodies became dry and hard- 
ened lumps of clay. Some have thought that the preserva- 
tion of the body through so many centuries did not agree 
with the Bible statement, " Dust thou art and unto dust 
thou shalt return;" but the real meaning here is that the 
body, being made of earth, shall return to the earth again, 
and the old mummies are only preserved portions of the 




Embalming. From the Ancient 
Tombs. 



x g4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

earth— the dust simply kept in the form wh?ch was given 
it in creation. It is, however, no less earth than if it were 
pulverized and scattered to the four winds of heaven. 

Our knowledge of the way the Egyptians embalmed 
their dead is obtained from the Greek, historians, and by a 

careful examination of the 
mummified bodies. Accord- 
ing; to Herodotus, the art was 
carried on by a professional 
body of men, appointed by 
law, and this is in accordance 
with the Scripture quoted, 
"Joseph commanded his serv- 
ants the physicians to em- 
balm Jacob." There were 
men duly appointed to attend to this work. 

A body might be embalmed in three different ways 
and the price varied accordingly. In the first and most ex- 
pensive method used, the brain and viscera were entirely 
removed from the body, washed in palm wine, and after be- 
ing covered with powdered aromatic gums were placed in 
jars made for the purpose, a number of which are to be 
seen in the Egyptian collection. The body was then filled 
with myrrh, cassia and other fragrant and astringent sub- 
stances, and was laid in natron* for seventy days. Forty 
days was probably the time actually spent in the work of 
embalming the body, but seventy days were required to 
pass before the burial took place. Thus we have both forty 
and seventy days in the Scripture quoted. After this the 
body was carefully washed and wrapped in fine linen, cov- 
ered with gum. The linen used was made in strips from 
three to four inches wide, and as many as four hundred 



"Native carbonate of soda. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. l8$ 

/ards were used in swathing a single body. The cost of em- 
oalming a body in this way was a talent of silver, or about 
one thousand and two hundred dollars. The body of Israel 
was doubtless embalmed after this manner. 

In the second method, which cost about four hundred 
dollars, the brain was not removed at all, and the body was 
also laid in salt or natron and wrapped in linen. The third 
method was employed only by the poor. It consisted in 
injecting some strong astringents into the body, and then 
laying it in salt for seventy days. The cost of this method 
was very small. These three methods were usually em- 
ployed, but there was still a fourth method, adopted only 
by the very poor, which was to fill the cavities of the body 
with bitumen, and soak it in salt and hot bitumen. This 
process destroyed the hair and features and left the skin 
like paper and the bones white and brittle. 

After the embalming process was fully completed, the 
body was placed in the coffin, which was usually made of 
sycamore wood. In some instances two or three coffins 
were used, fitting into each other like a nest of boxes. We 
examined a number of the sycamore coffins, all of which 
were over three thousand years old, and they are in a re- 
markable state of preservation. The inner coffin lid usual- 
ly had an inscription, giving the name, rank and date of 
birth and death of the deceased. The outer coffin was cov- 
ered with a coat of plaster, on which was usually painted a 
figure, representing the body in a reclining posture. 

Members of the royal families were, after being em- 
balmed in the most costly manner, placed in great stone 
coffins with closely-fitting lids, made of the same material. 
Several fine specimens of this kind of coffins are to be seen 
in the collection, and they are so placed that they can be 
easily examined. One of these, bearing date of B. C. 3633, 



jgg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

has part of the inner wooden coffin; it held the body o£ 
King Mykerinos, the builder of the third pyramid. Some 
of the pyramids were doubtless built as tombs for the 
kings. There were also rock-hewn and vaulted tombs used. 
The poor were buried in pits and caverns. 

Among the ancient Egyptians, according to Wilkinson 
the funeral rites of the wealthy and especially of a royal 
personage were attended with great pomp. At the death of 
the ruler a general mourning which lasted seventy-two days 
was proclaimed throughout the country. The people tore 
their garments, all the temples were closed, sacrifices were 
forbidden, and no festivals were celebrated during that pe- 
riod A procession of men and women to the number of 
two 'or three hundred, with their dresses attached below 
their breast, wandered through the streets, throwing dust 
upon their heads; and twice every day they sang the funer- 
al dirge in honor of the dead monarch, extolling his virtues 
and praising him in every way. A solemn fast was also ob- 
served; and they allowed themselves to taste neither meat 
nor wheaten bread, abstaining also from wine and every 
kind of luxury; nor did any one venture to use baths or 
ointments, to lie in soft beds, or in any way to gratify his 
appetites; giving himself up to mourning as if he had lost 

his best friend* 

The funeral processions of an Egyptian grandee were 
attended with much pomp and ceremony. Representations 
of such processions are to be seen in the frescoes on the 
walls of the ancient tombs, and they are remarkably well 
preserved First came a number of servants carrying ta- 
bles laden with fruit, cakes, flowers, vases of ointment, wine 
and other liquids, with three young geese and a calf for sac- 
rifice, chairs, and wooden tablets, napkins and other things. 

*" Ancient Egyptians," page 443, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 187 

Then others bringing the small closets in which the mum- 
my of the deceased and of his ancestors had been kept, 
while receiving the funeral liturgies previous to burial, and 
which sometimes contained the images of the gods. They 
also carried daggers, bows, sandals, and fans; each man 
having a kerchief or napkin on his shoulder. Next came a 
table of offerings, couches, easy chairs, boxes and a chari- 
ot; and then the charioteer with a pair of horses yoked in 
another car, which he drove as he followed on foot, in to- 
ken of respect to his late master. After these were men 
carrying gold vases on a table, with other offerings, boxes, 
and a large case upon a sledge borne on poles by four men, 
superintended by two officers of the priestly order; then 
others bearing small images of his ancestors, arms, fans, 
the scepters, signets, collars, necklaces, and other things 
appertaining to his office. To these succeeded the bearers 
of the sacred boat, while others carried the small images of 
blue pottery, representing the deceased under the form of 
Osiris, and the bird emblematic of the soul. Following 
these were seven or more men bearing upon staves or 
wooden yokes cases filled with flowers and bottles for liba- 
tion; and then seven or eight women, having their heads 
bound with fillets, beating their breasts, throwing dust upon 
their heads, and uttering doleful lamentations for the de- 
ceased, intermixed with praises of his virtue. 

Next came the hearse, placed in the consecrated boat 
upon a sledge, drawn by four oxen and seven men, under 
the direction of a superintendent who regulated the march 
of the procession. A high functionary of the priestly or- 
der walked close to the boat, in which the chief mourners, 
the nearest female relatives of the deceased, stood or sat at 
either end of the coffin; and sometimes his widow, holding 
a child in her arms, united her lamentations with prayers 



x g8 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

for her tender offspring, who added its tribute of sorrow to 
that of its afflicted mother. 

The sarcophagus was decked with flowers, and on the 
sides were painted alternately the emblems of stability and 
security. Behind the hearse followed the male relatives 
and friends of the deceased, some beating their breasts; 
others, if not giving the same tokens of grief, at least show- 
ing their sorrow by their silence and solemn step as they 
walked leaning on their long sticks. These closed the pro- 
cession.* 

Such was the funeral procession of a royal scribe or a 
member of the priestly order in ancient Egypt. Arriving 
at the tomb, the body was placed in the chamber which the 
deceased had prepared for it at great expense during his 
lifetime. Cut and chiseled in the living rock of the moun- 
tains, the tombs were practically indestructible. 

After the tombs had been cut, the face of the rocky 
walls, ceilings and columns was made as smooth as possi- 
ble and then covered with a thin coating of plaster which 
was susceptible of a very fine polish. On the walls, thus 
prepared, were carved and painted scenes in the life of the 
occupant of the tomb, and generally, if the dead were of 
note, a brief sketch of his life was inscribed on the walls or 
columns. In some of the tombs of the kings a history of 
the wars in which they were engaged and many interesting 
incidents in their lives are given. Thus the tombs, with 
the written history on their walls and the books of papyrus 
laid in them with the dead, became libraries and are of 
great historical value. 

At Beni Hassan there are thirty-nine rock tombs in the 
face of the mountain side. We shall describe only two of 
the most important, or, rather, we will combine the two m 

* Abridged from "The Ancient Egyptians," Wilkinson. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



one description. On approaching the cliff in which the 
tombs are cut, the portico, twenty-one feet square, with col- 
umns seventeen feet high, supporting beams on which rests 
the slightly-arched ceiling, presents a striking appearance. 
It looks very much as if it had been built as the entrance 
to a large building. But, on going into' it, we at once see 
that part of the living rock of the mountain side has been 
cut away, leaving columns, beams, ceiling and walls of the 
natural rock. Each of the columns is sixteen-sided, finely 
proportioned and beautifully designed. From the inner 
side of the portico is a door opening into a long gallery, 
which descends so rapidly that we walk down with difficul- 
ty. At the lower end of the gallery a door opens into a 
large chamber, and at one end of this an opening was made 
for the body of the dead. After the body was placed in it 
the opening was walled up and the whole plastered over. 
The walls and ceilings of the gallery are covered with 
paintings, figures in bas-relief, and hieroglyphics. Speaking 
of these tombs and the paintings and sculpture they con- 
tain, Hoply says: " In these vast galleries you may wander 
at will and study the every-day life of men who walked the 
land before the days of Joseph. In these mansions of the 
dead mimic men and women are wrestling, fishing, plough- 
ing and reaping, trapping birds, giving dinner parties, 
being flogged, cutting their toe-nails, treading the wine- 
press, dancing, playing the harp, weaving linen, playing at 
catch ball, being shaved by the barber, playing at draughts. 
Verily, there is nothing new under the sun. The old, old 
story of life is there, told as in a picture book. Though 
seen through a gap of four thousand years, the eye mois- 
tens over it still. Here are life's festive scenes and revels, — 
the wine-cup and the garland; and here its scenes of sor- 
row,— mourners are weeping over their dead. Nothing is 



IQO WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

lacking. And so, by a mystic touch of sympathy— that 
touch of nature which links man to man, — you reach out a 
hand across the ages, and feel the throbbings of a human- 
ity kindred with your own." 

One of the tombs, that of Amen-i, has the following de- 
scription of the good qualities of the dead: " I have never 
made a child to grieve, I have never robbed the widow, I 
have never repulsed the laborer, I have never shut up a 
herdsman, I have never impressed for forced labor the la- 
borers of a man who only employed five men; there was 
never a person miserable in my time, no one went hungry 
during my rule, for if there were years of scarcity, I 
ploughed up all the arable land in the name of Meh (dis- 
trict), up to its very frontiers north and south. By this 
means I made the people live, and procured for them pro- 
visions, so that there was not a hungry person among them. 
I gave to the widow the same amount as I gave to the mar- 
ried woman, and I made no distinction between the great 
and the little in all that I gave. And, behold, when the in- 
undation was great, and the owners of the land became rich 
thereby, I laid no additional tax on the fields." 

Here it will be seen that the inscription in the tomb of 
Ameni refers to years of scarcity and of plenty, thus inci- 
dentally confirming the Bible account of the years of plenty 
and the years of famine. In one of these tombs is a pic- 
ture which is believed by some Bible scholars to represent 
the arrival of Jacob and his family in Egypt. We examine 
it closely. The king is seated on his throne, and thirty- 
seven persons stand before him. They all appear distinc- 
tively Jewish. There can be no mistake as to the features. 
It has been stated that only Jacob and his sons and their 
wives and legitimate descendants were presented to Phara- 
oh, and that these numbered thirty-seven. The view that 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



IQI 



this scene represents the coming of Jacob and his family in- 
to Egypt has not been generally accepted, but there is no 
doubt that it represents people from the Land of Canaan. 

Mr. Newberry, whom we had the pleasure of meeting, 
and who gave us valuable information, is at work in the 
tombs at Beni Hassan, under the direction of the Egyptian 
Exploration Fund. We are hoping for important develop- 
ments under his skillful management of the work. It is 
carried on entirely by voluntary contribution, and appeals 
strongly to all who are interested in the study of the Bible 
and the evidences of its truth found in Egypt to-day. 
Those who have money to give should not hesitate to place 
some of it in the Egyptian Exploration Fund. . 



CHAPTER XI. 



An Egyptian Sugar Factory —Coptic Convent.— Tell el Amama.— The 
Tablets, Letters from Adonizedek King of Jerusalem.— The Hebrew 
Invasion of Palestine.— Wonderful Testimony of the Truth of the 
Bible.— Tell el Hesy Tablets. 

N our journey up the Nile, before reaching Beni Has- 
san and its rock-cut tombs, we stop for a night at 
Maghaghah, where there is located a large govern- 
ment sugar factory. We were invited to inspect the 
work of sugar-making and found in the factory modern ma- 
chinery for crushing the cane and making the sugar. The 
natives who work in the factory are mostly without cloth- 
ing, except a cloth worn about the loins. The amount of 
filth and dirt to be seen about the place entirely destroyed 
our desire for Egyptian sugar. 

Still farther south we pass a mountain known as Gebel 
et-Tir, or the 44 Bird Mountain." Immense numbers of 
birds are to be seen here. The fertile imagination of the 
Arabs has invented the following tradition about Gebel et- 
Tir: All the birds in Egypt assemble here once each year, 
and when departing leave behind them one solitary bird to 
watch until their return the next year, when another is set 
to watch in his place. 

The mountain rises about seven hundred feet above the 
river and on its summit stands a Coptic convent, said to 
have been built by St. Helena A. D. 350 * It is called the 
"Convent of the Pulley" because the ascent to the build- 

*•< Sozomen's Ecclesiastical History," II, 2. 
192 




WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. I93 

ing is made by means of a rope and pulley. Curzon visited 
the place and examined the interior of the convent and 
church. "The church," he says, "is partly subterranean, 
being built in the recesses of an ancient stone quarry; the 
other parts are plastered over. The roof is flat and is 
formed of horizontal beams of palm trees, upon which a 
terrace of reeds and earth is laid. The height of the interi- 
or is about twenty-five feet. On entering the door we had 
to descend a flight of narrow steps, which led into a side 
aisle about ten feet wide, which is divided from the nave by 
octagon columns of great thickness supporting the walls. 
The columns were surmounted by heavy square plinths al- 
most in the Egyptian style. I consider this church to be 
interesting from its being half a catacomb, or cave, and one 
of the earliest Christian buildings which has preserved its 
originality. It is found upon examination that the building 
is constructed on the principle of a Latin basilica, as the 
buildings of the Empress Helena usually were."* 

About one hundred and eighty miles south of Cairo 
are the celebrated tombs of Tell el Amarna, now in ruins. 
In 1887 a peasant woman of Egypt was digging among the 
ruins and sifting the dust to sow on the grain, fields, when 
she discovered the now famous Amarna tablets. To the 
poor peasant woman who found them the tablets were only 
small, oblong pieces of burned clay, flat on either side and 
covered with cuneiform characters. To her they had no 
more value than a piece of broken pottery; to the scholar 
who could decipher the writing they were of incalculable 
value. The tablets are now in the Berlin and British Muse- 
ums. Major Conder has just given to the world a transla- 
tion of the most important of those tablets and to him we 
are indebted for our information on this subject.f 

*Curzon, " Monasteries of the Levant," page 109. 
t " The Tell Amarna Tablets, " - R. E. Conder. 



ig4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The tablets are simply a series of letters written to the 
king of Egypt and some of his high officers by the rulers 
of the Amorites, the Phoenicians and Philistines dwelling in 
the land of Canaan, and at that time subject to the king of 
Egypt. The names of Japhia king of Lachish, and Jabin 
king of Hazor and probably Adonizedek king of Jerusalem, 
mentioned by Joshua * occur among those of the writers of 
the letters. 

The tablets are made of clay in the usual form. When 
the clay was soft the writing was inscribed, after which the 
tablets were burned, thus rendering them practically inde- 
structible. Conder says the clay in different parts of the 
country differs and gives various colors and surfaces to the 
tablets, so that it has been found possible by the clay alone 
to decide with some certainty the derivation of a few of the 
tablets when the name of the writer is lost. We cannot do 
better than give a synopsis of what Major Conder says of 
this valuable discovery: 

In these tablets we have become possessed of a mass 
of correspondence dated at about the time when, according 
to the Bible, the Hebrew invasion under Joshua took place 
and which in bulk is equal to about half of the Pentateuch. 

The language of the letters is very like the Aramaic of 
the Talmud, and more nearly resembles the Arabic than 
the Hebrew. It is the same language, in an archaic condi- 
tion, which is now spoken by the peasantry in Palestine. 
The recovery of some one hundred and thirty towns men- 
tioned in the letters not only makes the topography clear, 
but enables us to fix approximately the historical order of 
the letters. It settles the sites of several important places, 
such as Gath, Makkedah, Baal Gad, Enam, Lachish, etc., 
and it illustrates the Bible geography. The personal 



*Joshua 10: 3; n: 1. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. I95 

names are very interesting, being Hebraic, except in the 
case of Hittite names which are Mongolic. Egyptian 
words occur wherever reference is made to Egyptian offi- 
cials. The names of the gods are those found in the Bible, 
including Baal, Baaloth, Rimmon, Shamash, Nebo, Dagon 
and Addu. The civilization of the times is abundantly 
shown, and various kinds of cities are specified, such as 
" capital cities," " provincial cities," " fortresses," towns, vil- 
lages and camps. The irrigation of gardens is also noticed 
and the papyrus grown at Gebel; as well as copper, tin, 
gold, silver, agate, money (not, of course, coins) and pre- 
cious objects of many kinds; mulberries, olives, corn, ships 
and chariots. 

But the most interesting letters are from the southern 
part of Palestine, and thsse refer with great clearness to the 
conquest of the country between Mount Seir on the east, 
Ajalon, Lachish, Ascalon and Gezer on the west, and Shi- 
loh and Rimmon on the north. The name of one of the 
kings killed by Joshua, Japhia, Josh. 10: 3, is found in the 
south, and in all probability that of Adonizedek of Jerusa- 
lem also; and in the north the name of the king of Hazor is 
probably to be read as Jabin, which was the name of the 
king of Hazor whom Joshua attacked (Josh. 11: 1). The 
Hebrews, it is stated in the letters, came from the desert, 
and from Mount Seir. 

The date of the letters is exactly that which is to be 
derived from the Bible (1 Kings 6: 1) for the Hebrew inva- 
sion, according to the Hebrew and Vulgate text; the Septu- 
agint makes it forty years later. The letters state that the 
Egyptian troops had been withdrawn in the year in which 
the Hebrews came from the desert. 

These letters are the most important historical records 
ever found in connection with the Bible, and they most ful- 



jq6 wanderings in bible lands. 

ly confirm the historical statements of the Book of Joshua, 
and prove the antiquity of civilization in Syria and Pales- 
tine.* 

After two years of hard labor Conder has translated 
these important records of the past, ages and now, thanks 
to his painstaking labor, we may read and understand them. 
They are interesting reading, but when to their general in- 
terest is added the fact that they so fully confirm the Bible 
they become all the more valuable. The letters cover the 
Hittite invasion of Damascus, the Amorite treachery, the 
war in Phoenicia, Northern Palestine, Tyre and Sidon, 
Southern Palestine, Joppa, Makkedah, Jerusalem, Lachish 
and other places. The letters from Southern Palestine re- 
fer to the invasion of the country by the Hebrews. 

We give Conder' s translation of several interesting and 
valuable 

LETTERS FROM JERUSALEM. 

" To the King my Lord is mourning thus this Adonize- 
dek thy servant. At the feet of my Lord, of the King, sev- 
en times and seven times I bow. What shall I ask of. the 
King my Lord? They have prevailed, they have (taken 
the fortress of Jericho) they who have gathered against the 
King of Kings, which Adonizedek has explained to the 
King his Lord. Behold, as to me, my father is not and my 
army is not. The tribe that has ground me in this place is 
very rebellious to the King, the same is gathering near me 
for the house of my father. Why has the tribe sinned 
against the King my Lord? Behold O King my Lord 
arise! I say to the chief men of the King my Lord ' Why 
is the land in slavery to the chief of the Hebrews and the 
rulers fear the end? So now they must send from the pres- 
ence of the King my Lord.' Behold I say that the land of 

* " The Tell Amarna Tablets," page 36. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. igj 

the King my Lord is ruined. So now they must send to 
the King my Lord, and let the King my Lord know this; 
behold the King my Lord has placed a garrison to stop the 
way ... of kings . . . chiefs of the garrison , . . 
the king as master to his land . . . as to his land she 
has rebelled, the (lands) of the King my Lord — the whole 
of it. . . . And let one warn the King as to his land. I 
myself speak pleading with the King my Lord and (for 
once?) let the King my Lord behold the entreaties. And 
the wars are mighty against me, and am not I forced to 
ask — to ask a letter from the King my Lord? And let an 
order return from the King (my Lord). Whether will he 
not order chiefs for garrison? And let him be kind, and 
let the King my Lord regard the entreaties. This tribe be- 
hold O King my Lord has risen up. Lo the chief men 
they have expelled. I say the lands of the King my Lord 
are ruined. Dost not thou hear this same of me? They 
have destroyed all the rulers. There is no ruler now O 
King my Lord. Let the King give his countenance to the 
chiefs; and whether shall the chiefs of the Egyptian sol- 
diers remain at rest? They have lingered O King my 
Lord. The lands are failing to the King my Lord. The 
Hebrew chiefs plunder all the King's lands. Since the 
chiefs of the Egyptian soldiers have gone away quitting 
the lands this year O King my Lord, and since there is no 
chief of the Egyptian soldiers there is ruin to the lands of 
the King my Lord. They have . . . O King my Lord, 
and Adonizedck (is) dust. . . . messages (are asked?) 
of the King my Lord, there is destruction by the foe of the 
lands of the King my Lord." 

Another letter from Adonizedek tells of the success of 
the Hebrews. He says: "The King's land rebels to the 
chiefs of the Hebrews, and now against this capital city 



jgg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

U-ru-sa-lim (Jerusalem) the city called Beth Baalatu (Baa- 
lath) a neighbor of the city of the King-has rebelled, to 
delay the chiefs of the city of Kielti. Let the King hear as 
to Adonizedek; and will not he order Egyptian soldiers, 
and shall not the King's land turn to the King? And be- 
cause there are no Egyptian soldiers the King's land has 
rebelled to the chiefs of the tribe of the Hebrews." 

The strong appeal made in these letters to the king of 
Egypt seems to have been without avail. The affairs of 
Adonizedek were becoming more critical. The Hebrews 
had already subdued part of the land and the fear of them 
fell upon the kings. And here let us compare with the let- 
ters of Adonizedek the following language: " Now it came 
to pass when Adonizedek king of Jerusalem had heard 
how Joshua had taken Ai, and had utterly destroyed it; as 
he had done to Jericho and her king, so he had done to Ai 
and her king; and how the inhabitants of Gibeon had made 
peace with Israel, and were among them; that they feared 
greatly, because Gibeon was a great city, as one of the roy- 
al cities, and because it was greater, than Ai, and all the 
men thereof were mighty." Josh. 10: I, 2. What a won- 
derful testimony is found on these old tablets, written four- 
teen hundred years before Christ, of the truth of the Bible! 

But the entreaties of Adonizedek and his appeals to 
the king of Egypt for help brought no aid, and again he 
appealed for help against the Hebrew interfere. After the 
usual salutation he says: « Lo! the King my Lord has estab- 
lished his law from the (rising?) of the Sun to the going 
down of the Sun. He is a flatterer who deceives as to me. 
Lo' am not I a ruler myself, a man allied to the King my 
Lord? Lo! I myself am a good chief of the King, and I 
have sent tribute to the King. There is no chief to join me, 
and my friends (or army) fail; they have been fighting for 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



the King mightily. I remain ... in this Beth Amilla 
[evidently the Beth ham Millo of the Bible, 2 Sam. 5: 9.] 
. . . I am giving to the chief of the servants. Siaita the 
King's chief (resident) takes charge from before me of 
twenty-three princesses. Twenty chiefs who remain trusty 
I am detaching. Sunta has led (them) away to the King 
my Lord, which the King advises to his country. [It would 
seem from the sending away of his women that Adonizedek 
himself was preparing to flee, by the advice, it would seem, 
of Egypt.] . . . They have fought against me as far as 
the lands of Seir as far as the city Givti (which they have 
wasted). They have banded together against all the chiefs 
of the governments, and they have fought with me. Be- 
hold I, the chief of the lords (or of the Amorites), am 
breaking to pieces, and the King my Lord does not regard 
entreaties, while they have fought against me (unceasing- 
ly?). Behold array O mighty King a fleet in the midst of 
the sea. Thou shalt march to our land. . . . Thou 
shalt march against the chieftains of the Hebrew. . . . 
Since there are no Egyptian soldiers in this same year de- 
struction has destroyed the people of all the lands of the 
King my Lord. ... To the scribe of the King my 
Lord, (lo!) Adonizedek is his servant, at his feet (he 
bows)." 

Again Adonizedek poured out his troubles to the king 
of Egypt, but to no purpose. How applicable are the 
words of the prophet to him: " Lo, thou trustest in the staff 
of this broken reed, on Egypt; whereon if a man lean, it 
will go into his hand, and pierce it: so is Pharaoh king of 
Egypt to all that trust him." Isa. 36: 6. 

His next letter names a number of Bible cities. He 
says: "Let him know that they have fought all the lands 
that have been at peace with me; and let me warn the King 



200 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

as to his land. Lo! the land of the city of Gezer, and the 
land of the city of Ascalon, and the land of the city of (La- 
chish?) they have given (or settled) for themselves. Corn 
and oil (or fruit) and all things, this race has altogether 
gathered. And let me warn the King as to Egyptian sol- 
diers. Will not he order Egyptian soldiers against the chiefs 
who have done wrong to the King my Lord? Since within 
this year the Egyptian soldiers have gone away, and quit 
the lands, the ruler of the King my Lord— since there were 
no Egyptian soldiers— is brought to nought. Yea and the 
rulers of the King. . . . Behold the land of the city of 
Jerusalem. They are gathering. The chief says he will at- 
tack me to besiege. His tribe is not at all subject to me. 
The tribes are armed (or arrayed). They are not subject 
to me. Lo! my desire is the same as the desire of Milcilu 
and the desire of the sons of Labaya, that the chiefs of the 
Hebrews be subject to the King's land. Lo! the King my 
Lord will be just to me, because the chiefs are sorcerers. 
... Lo he is strong, (determined?) and (men) have 
feared. . . . The tribe is pouring out . . . lands 
from the city of As(calon.) ... Up to the house of my 
Lord Pauru the King's chief for the land of the city of Je- 
rusalem my foe is rebelling. Up to the chiefs of the gar- 
rison this chief has surged up ... to me is my foe, 
who rebels against me. There is no end of his desires . . 
this, despatched to me a chief, of the King, despatched to 
this thy people. (The women?) are despatched to the 
King my Lord (with) men who have been upright. Four 
messengers . . . to go out. The chiefs of the fort (or 
camp) are closing the roads of the pass . . . there is 
no possibility from ... the tribe who have caused the 
destruction of the city of Ajalon. Let this be known to the 
King my Lord. Have not they taken word— the people 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



201 



despatched. (There is) a road for the King, though it is 
not easy. Lo! the King my Lord has established his law 
in the land of the city of Jerusalem forever, and shall not 
they take word of the desertion of the lands of the city of 
Jerusalem? To the scribe of the King my Lord this lam- 
entation thus (speaks) Ado?iizedek thy servant— the afflict- 
ed. Translate the messages well to the King my Lord. 
. . . (I am) afflicted, greatly am I afflicted. And thou 
shalt perform the desire of our people before the chiefs of 
the land of Cush. Truly is not there slaughter with us?" 

After this letter was written came that wonderful 
forced march when Joshua " came unto them suddenly, and 
went up from Gilgal all night." Josh. 10: 9. And at Gibe- 
on the great battle was fought which practically gave 
Joshua possession of Southern Palestine. No wonder 
Adonizedek wrote to the king of Egypt that "men feared 
the Hebrews." Their victorious armies, trained by long 
marching on the desert and commanded by an able leader, 
brought down all opposition. The five kings of the Amo- 
rites, Adonizedek among them, " fled and hid themselves in 
a cave at Makkedah." And here a watch was set upon 
them until the slaughter of their followers had ended. 
Another letter was written by Adonizedek to the king of 
Egypt and Major Conder is of the opinion that it was writ- 
ten in the cave of Makkedah after the defeat of Ajalon. It 
is the last of the series and has a peculiar interest, for soon 
after it was written and sent by a trusty messenger, Joshua 
commanded the cave to be opened and the five kings to be 
brought out. " And they did so, and brought forth those 
five kings unto him out of the cave, the king of Jerusalem, 
the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of La- 

chish, and the king of Eglon And afterward 

Joshua smote them, and slew them." Josh. 10: 23, 26. 



202 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

War was terrible in those times and there was no play 
about it. In the light of these events the last letter of 
Adonizedek possesses more than ordinary interest. 

"And lo now! the city of Jerusalem when these went 
away from the land (was) faithful, to the King. Lo! the 
city of Gaza has remained to the King. Behold the land 
of Harti Cirmiel (Carmel) belonging to Taka?iu and the 
men of the city Givti, they have bowed down, going away 
from the land quietly. And truly we do so. Behold Laba- 
ya! and the land Salabimi (Shaalabbin, Josh. 19: 42, near 
Ajalon) are inhabited by the Hebrew chiefs. Milcilu has 
sent for (tribute?) and the fellows (say) 4 Have we not 
indeed dwelt in this land?' They are adjudging all that 
they desire to the men of the city of Keilah. And truly 
we are leaving the city of Jerusalem. The chiefs of the 
garrison have left— without an order— through the wastings 
of this fellow (Joshua) whom I fear. These march to 
Addasi. He has remained in his land (or camp) in the 
city of Gaza. . . . (women?) ... to the land of 
Egypt." 

It seems to be clear from the letters that, after sending 
away his women, Adonizedek hoped in the event of the 
defeat of the five kings to escape into Egypt by way of 
Gaza, which is not mentioned in the Bible as having been 
taken by Joshua. It was in Gaza that they expected to 
find safety. But they had been entrapped in the cave at 
Makkedah and came out only to meet death. 

So ends this remarkable correspondence. We have 
given but a fragment of it, but enough to show that the 
translator is correct when he says "that these letters are 
the most important historical records ever found in connect 
tion with the Bible." By them the Book of Joshua is most 
wonderfully confirmed, as well as the entire Bible history 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 203 

of the Israelites. The letters also show that at that remote 
period civilization prevailed in Syria and Palestine, and 
that Joshua did not meet and conquer tribes of savages, but 
civilized men. 

The discovery of the Tell Amarna Tablets has led to 
further investigation at the site of Lachish in Palestine. 
The place is known as Tell el Hesy. In 1892 Mr. Bliss 
commenced an ex- 
cavation at Lachish 
for the Palestine Ex- 
ploration Fund and 
carried it forward with 
considerable zeal and 
energy. His labors 
during the season 
brought no immediate 
results, and it was not 
until he was about 
closing his work in 
December, the rainy 
season having set in, 
that he was fortunate 
enough to find a num- 
ber of tablets. He 
was overjoyed at his good luck. The tablets are now being 
translated. Enough is already known of them to settle the 
fact that they are of great importance. It is believed that 
some of them are answers to the letters written to Egypt 
which are preserved to the world in the Tell Amarna 
Tablets. Our cuts are copies from "The Tell Amarna 
Tablets'' and represent the front and reverse sides of one 
of the tablets recently discovered at Lachish. 




Tell el Hesy Tablet. {Front.) 



204 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Conder's translation and comments on this tablet are as 
follows: Is it not sent (as a message) to the great chief 
of the house of our fathers? Lo! truly thou knowest that 
they have fortified the city of Atim. And O Zimridi to 
the feet of him who is established as the chieftain behold 
humbly I bow. Supporter of cities behold! O Saviour of 
the people I have rent (my garments) yea . . entreaties 

. . . for defenders And three years or 

four the foe (or dog) 
has been resting who 
desires my country. 
Now behold they have 
entered the land to lay 
waste. The city of 
Sumhi (or Stem' a) 
which we inhabit he is 
surrounding: he has 
gathered in order to 
besiege; and as far as 
this are going thir- 
teen sections of our 
(tribe?). Strong (is 
he) who has come 
down. He lays waste. 
He has gone out with secret feet. . . . . I send and 
they have (arrayed?) the land of the race of my foe: 
may his land perish.' 

" It will be seen from the facsimile of the tablet that 
the signs are irregularly written, and many of them much 
worn, so that the translation is difficult, and uncertain in 
parts of the text. 

"This letter comes apparently from the low hills 
south-east of Lachish. Atim must be the Etam of the 




WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



205 



south of.Judah (1 Chron. 4: 32), which I have placed at the 
ruin of 'Aitzm; and Samhi (or as it may be otherwise ren- 
dered Sam' a) is the large ruin of Sani ah, on the higher 
hills, which is five miles to the south of Etam. The letter 
is of great interest. The marauders, as in other cases, come 
from the Hebron hills. It also shows us that the com- 
munication by tablets in cuneiform script was not only 
usual in writing to Egypt, but in the internal correspond- 
ence of the country. The Phoenician alphabet had not as 
yet come into use, but the ruins of Palestine, no doubt, still 
contain other tablets of this age or of earlier times. The 
letter, though not as important in some ways as the Moab- 
ite stone and Siloam text, is one of the most valuable 
discoveries ever made in Palestine."* 

We shall await with much anxiety the translation of 
other tablets already found. Wonderful as these recent 
discoveries have been we may expect others fully as impor- 
tant. In the meantime it may be well for those who are 
giving so much time to higher criticism to look well to 
these records of the past. One of Adonizedek's letters 
overthrows a dozen speculations as to the Book of Joshua, 
and discoveries yet to be made will, under God's hand, en- 
tirely silence the teachers who, under the cloak of religion, 
are doing more to destroy faith in God's Book than are the 
outspoken infidels. 

While we have been examining the tablets our boat has 
been stemming the current of the Nile and we are ap- 
proaching the City of Assiut, the most important place in 
Upper Egypt. It has a population of thirty-one thousand, 
six hundred, and is connected with Cairo by rail. 

The landing-place at Assiut is a mile from the city and 
no sooner is our boat tied up to the shore than donkey-boys 

*Tell Amarna Tablets," pages 133, 134. 



206 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



and itinerant merchants come down upon us with a rush. 
It is impossible for the passengers to go ashore on account 
of the crowd, until Achmet Matcour, our Nile dragoman, 
with heavy whip in hand clears a passageway. The 
donkey-boys tell the good qualities of their little animals in 
a mixture of Arabic, English, German, French and Italian 
wonderful to hear. The merchants are no less busy and 
noisy in trying to sell their wares. Here is a vender of 
beautiful ostrich feathers (for now we are really in Africa, 
the home of the ostrich), offering the finest white plumes 
at a price less than half what the poorest sell for at home. 
Yonder is a seller of canes and we are attracted to him, for 
we have a weakness in that direction, and a finely-polished 
ebony walking-stick changes ownership. 

On the landing platform sits a dignified Moslem with 
his wares spread before him. His green turban carefully 
folded about his head indicates that he has made a pilgrim- 
age to Mecca, and the respect shown him by his fellows 
tells the same story. His stock in trade consists of beads, 
scarabs, agates cut and polished, old lamps and other an- 
tiquities. We select several small agates from his stock 
and ask him the price; he replies by naming a sum at least 
four times greater than their real value. We lay them 
down and turn away, when he says: " How much you 
give?" In reply, an offer is made for them above their 
real value. It is amusing to see this follower of Mo- 
hammed assume an air of offended dignity as he refuses 
the offer. During our stay at Assiut we passed and re- 
passed the merchant a number of times, but no reference 
was made to the agates. On the following day just as our 
boat was pulling away from the shore, a lad came alongside 
holding the selfsame agates in his hand and offered them 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



207 



to us at our own price. The dignified pilgrim to Mecca 
was selling his goods by proxy. 

Selecting a bright-looking Arab boy who speaks Eng- 
lish fairly well we walk through the town of Assiut. Our 
guide is well-informed and faithful and we enjoy an inter- 
esting stroll about the city. We visit the business 
streets where the bazaars, as the shops and stores are 
called, are located. While these are not equal to the ba- 
zaars at Cairo, they are interesting. The place is noted for 
the beautiful red pottery which is made here and offered 
for sale on every hand. Some of the vases are really hand- 
some and are patterned after the forms used by the ancient 
Egyptians. In Egypt, as well as in Palestine, the skins of 
goats are used for holding water and wine. In the market- 
place here kid skins, which have been prepared for holding 
water or milk, are offered for sale. They are also used as 
churns. The cream is put into them and then the skin 
bottle is shaken until butter is produced. 

The camel market, held in a great open square in the 
suburbs of the city, is also a place of interest to the 
traveler. Entering the place we find it crowded, and the 
noise made by the buyers and sellers and the growling of 
the camels is deafening. How business can be transacted 
in such confusion is a mystery. But sales are made, 
money paid, and the noise and confusion continue. We 
learn that about sixty dollars is the highest price paid for 
the very best camels. The price ranges from this to as low 
as twenty dollars for those of an inferior grade. 

West of the city about three miles, in the limestone of 
the Libyan Mountains, are a number of ancient tombs. A 
short ride on a donkey brings us to the foot of the hills 
where there is a modern Arab cemetery. The dark open- 
ings of the tombs and caves in the mountain side can be 



208 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

seen for some distance before we reach the place. At the 
base of the mountain we dismount and climb up to the 
tombs. Here the dead of Saut, the ancient name of Assiut, 
were laid away to rest. Here, too, were the tombs of the 
sacred wolf, for one of the gods of the ancient Egyptians 
was the wolf-headed Anubis. In front of the now rifled 
tombs may be seen the mummies and bones of various an- 
imals. Pieces of mummy cloth also strew the ground. 

From the top of the mountain a beautiful view is ob- 
tained of the fertile valley of the Nile. The Arabian and 
Libyan hills on either side shut out the desert and one sees 
only the rich fields of grain, the palm gardens, the flow- 
ing river, and the beautiful town of Assiut with its eleven 
minarets pointing heavenward. On the return to the city 
funeral processions are met bearing the dead to the 
cemetery. One is reminded of the processions of the same 
kind seen so often in Cairo. These however produce "a 
much more solemn effect, through the absence of the bus- 
tle of the crowded streets and the presence of the deserted 
city of the dead. Nowhere, not even in Cairo, are the fu- 
neral songs so strange and weird as here, or sung by such 
deep and tuneful voices. 

At Assiut, and indeed at every landing-place along 
the Nile, the traveler is beset by dealers in scarabs (small 
stone images of the sacred beetle). We were fortunate 
enough to see a living specimen of this famous black beetle 
which was sacred to the ancient Egyptians as an emblem of 
the creation and continual life. The beetle is about a 
half inch long and shiny black. In the soft mud of the 
Nile the beetle deposits its eggs and then rolls them over 
and over until they assume the form of a ball, which is 
then rolled to the sand of the desert and buried there. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 209 

Miss Edwards has given such an admirable description 
of this Egyptian beetle that we give it to our readers: 
"We all know the old story of how this beetle lays its eggs 
by the river's brink, encloses them in a ball of moist clay, 
rolls the ball to a safe place on the edge of the desert; 
buries it in the sand; and when his time comes dies con- 
tent, having provided for the safety of his successors. 
Hence his mythic fame; hence all the quaint symbolism 
that by degrees attached itself to his little person, and 
ended by investing him with a special sacredness which has 
often been mistaken for actual worship. Standing by thus, 
watching the movements of the creature, its untiring 
energy, its extraordinary muscular strength, its business- 
like devotion to the matter in hand, one sees how subtle a 
lesson the old Egyptian moralists had presented to them 
for contemplation, and with how fine a combination of wis- 
dom and poetry they regarded this little black scarab not 
only as an emblem of creative and preserving power, but 
perhaps also of the immortality of the soul. As a type, no 
insect has ever had so much greatness thrust upon him. 
He became a hieroglyph, and stood for a word both to be 
and to transform. His portrait was multiplied a million 
fold; sculptured over the portals of temples; fitted to the 
shoulders of a god; engraved on gems; moulded in pottery; 
painted on sarcophagi and the walls of tombs; worn by the 
living and buried with the dead. 

" Every traveler on the Nile brings away a handful of 
the smaller scarabs, genuine or otherwise. Some may not 
particularly care to possess them, yet none can help buying 
them, if only because other people do so, or to get rid of 
a troublesome dealer, or to give to friends at home. I 
doubt, however, if even the most enthusiastic scarab- 
fanciers really feel in all its force the symbolism attaching 



210 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

to these little gems, or appreciate the exquisite naturalness 
of their execution until they have seen the living beetle at 
work."* 

Like all travelers we brought away with us a number 
of scarabs, some formed in stone, others moulded in 
pottery. Some large, some small, some ancient, and some 
modern, for the wily Arab manufactures stone and clay 
representations of the sacred beetle and sells them to un- 
suspecting travelers for the real, ancient scarab. One of 
undoubted antiquity was given to a friend and brought this 
response: 

" It was once the sacred token 
Of eternity unbroken 

And divine. 
Some long vanished priest or king, 
Lord or lady owned the thing, 
Now 'tis mine." 



* Edwards. " A Thousand Miles up the Nile," pages 96,97- 



CHAPTER XII. 



A Simoon. — Abydos. — List of the Kings of Egypt. — Thebes. — The 
Ruined Temples of Luxor. — Shishak and his Captives. — Rehoboam. 
— The Colossi. — The Valley of the Dead— The Tombs of the Kings. 

^W^f EAVING Assiut we continue our journey southward 
jJIW on the River of Egypt. Between Assiut and Luxor 
f^Ws- we have an experience with a sand-storm, or si- 
moon, as they are called on the desert. The wind blows a 
perfect gale, and the sand of the desert is caught and car- 
ried in great swirls across the plain. The finer particles fill 
the air, and so dense do they become that the sun is entire- 
ly obscured. We can well imagine what a storm of this 
kind would mean to travelers on the desert. Many cara- 
vans, overtaken by these terrible simoons, perish by the 
way, and the bones of man and beast whiten the desert 
route. We find it exceedingly uncomfortable in the middle 
of the river on our Nile steamer. 

On the west side of the river, about one hundred miles 
south of Assiut, is a landing-place called Belianeh; and 
about ten miles across the Nile valley from this place are 
the ruins of Abydos, which are in some respects the best 
preserved of all the ruins in Egypt. This is especially true 
of the wall sculpture, which is remarkably well preserved. 
In many of the ancient temples the sculptures have been 
defaced. Much of this was done by the Mohammedans. 
Regarding the sculptured figures as idols, they sought to 
destroy them by mutilating the faces. Our engraving 
shows the figure of one of the Pharaohs riding in a chariot 

211 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 213 

with drawn sword in one hand, but the face has been chis- 
eled away. The temples at Abydos were not excavated un- 
til A. D. 1853; hence their excellent state of preservation. 

The most important ruin at Abydos is the Memnon- 
ium, or the temple of Seti I, the father of the supposed op- 
pressor of the Israelites, Rameses II. On one of the walls 
Rameses II " relates all that he has done for the honor of 
his father's memory, how he erected statues of him at 
Thebes, and how he built up the sacred doors. At the end 
he gives a sketch of his childhood, and the various grades 
of rank and dignity which he held." In this temple is the 
now famous Abydos Tablet, which gives the names of 
seventy-six kings of Egypt, beginning with Menes and end- 
ing with Seti I. The name of each ruler in hieroglyphics is 
enclosed with lines. The names of the kings of the nine- 
teenth dynasty are here given. The names include the sup- 
posed Pharaohs of the oppression and exodus, Rameses II 
and Menephthah I. 

The temple of Rameses II at Abydos is also well worth 
a visit. It is well preserved. Here was found the second 
tablet of Abydos, which is now in the British Museum. 
North of the latter temple is a Coptic monastery and 
church which we visited. We are shown the baptismal 
pool where baptism is still administered by trine immer- 
sion. The monks are engaged in work about the place and 
we are impressed with the thought that their existence 
must be dull and dreary. They live here on the verge of 
the desert, deny themselves all the comforts of life, hoping 
thus to gain the favor of God. To us such a life seems 
selfish and fruitless, and entirely out of line with the exam- 
ple and teaching of our divine Master, who went about, 
mingling with humanity and doing good wherever he went. 



Men-pehtet-Ra, son of the Sun, Ra-messu. 

(Rameses L) 

Men-mat-Ra. son of the Sun, Ptah-meri-en-Seti. 

(Setil.) 

Usr-mat-Ra setep- son of the Ra-messu-meri-Amen. 
en-Ra, Sun, (Rameses II.) 



iBl. 



... — v,-™* Anc^t.npfpri-. Suten mut- Tui. 



Suten hemt Auset-nefert. 
Royal wife. 



Suten mut 
Royal mother. 



t8 3 . 



C 



Ba-Ra-meri-en- son of the Ptah-meri-en-hetep- 
Sun, her-mat. 

(Meneptah L] 



Amen, 



Men-ma- Ra setep- son of the Amen-rneses-heq- uast. 
en-Ra, Sun, (Amen-meses.) 



Usr-xeperu-Ra-meri- son of the Seti-meri-en-Ptah. 
Amen, Sun, (Setill). 

.««(SSj s (USD 

XU-en-Ra setep-en-Ra, son of the Ptah-meri-en-se-Ptah 
Sun, (Meneptah II.) 



Usr-xau-Ra setep-en- son of the Ra-meri Amen-merer 
Ra men- Amen, Sun. Set-ne^t, 

Cartouches of the Pharaohs. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



THEBES. 

South of Cairo four hundred and fifty miles we reach 
the greatest ruins in the world. These are the remains of 
Thebes the hundred-gated city of ancient Egypt, grand 
and magnificent even in her ruins. In the cuneiform in- 
scriptions and in the Bible it is called No, and No-amon. 
' Art thou better than No-amon, that was situate among 
the rivers, that had the waters round about her; whose ram- 
part was the sea, and her wall was of the sea? Ethiopia 
and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; . . yet 
was she carried away, she went into captivity."* At Thebes 
the god Amon was worshiped, and it was upon the temples 
and the worship of this god that a large portion of the 
wealth of the rulers of ancient Egypt was bestowed. The 
magnificent and gigantic temple erected to Amon by the 
Pharaohs, although now in ruins, is still one of the most 
interesting sights in Egypt. It was from this temple and 
the worship of Amon that the Bible name of the city was 
taken. 

When or by whom Thebes was founded is now a mat- 
ter of conjecture. Its early history has been lost. The 
discovery of ancient tombs shows that the city must have 
been founded as early as the time of Abraham. For cen- 
turies it was the capital city of the Pharaohs, who ruled 
over both Upper and Lower Egypt. They succeeded in 
making of their capital the most magnificent city of ancient 
times. Homer refers to it in these lines: 

"Where, in Egyptian Thebes the heaps of precious ingots gleam, 
The hundred-gated Thebes, where twice tenscore in martial style 
Of valiant men with. steeds and cars march through each massy gate." 

Diodorus visited the place B. C. 57 and writes of it as 
follows: "Afterward reigned Busirus, and eight of his pos- 

*Revised Version, Nahum 3: 8, 9. 




The Great Hall at Karnac by Moonlight. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 217 

terity after him; the last of which, of the same name with 
the first, built that great city which the Egyptians call Di- 
ospolis, the Greeks Thebes; it was in circuit one hundred 
and forty stadia [about twelve miles], adorned with stately 
public buildings, magnificent temples, and rich donations 
and revenues to admiration; and he built all the private 
houses, some four, some five stories high. And to sum up 
all in a word, made it not only the most beautiful and state- 
liest city in Egypt, but of all others in the world. The 
fame therefore of the riches and grandeur of this city was 
so noised abroad in every place, that the poet Homer takes 
notice of it. . . . Although there are some that say it 
had not a hundred gates; but there are many large porches 
to the temples, whence the city was called Hecatompylus, a 
hundred gates, for many gates; yet that it was certain they 
had in it twenty thousand chariots of war; for there were a 
hundred stables all along the river from Memphis to 
Thebes towards. Lybia, each of which was capable to hold 
two hundred horses, the marks and signs of which are vis- 
ible at this day. And we have it related, that not only this 
king, but the succeeding princes from time to time, made it 
their business to beautify the city; for that there was no 
city under the sun so adorned with so many stately monu- 
ments of gold, silver and ivory, and multitudes of colossi 
and obelisks, cut out of one entire stone. For there were 
four temples built, for beauty and greatness to be admired, 
the most ancient of which was in circuit about two miles, 
and five and forty cubits high, and had a wall twenty-four 
feet broad. The ornaments of this temple were suitable to 
its magnificence, both for cost and workmanship. The fab- 
ric hath continued to our time, but the silver and gold, and 
ornaments of ivory and precious stones were carried away 
by the Persians when Cambyses burnt the temples of 



2i8 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Egypt. . • • These they say are the wonderful sepul- 
chres of the ancient kings, which for state and grandeur far 
exceed all that posterity can attain unto at this day. The 
Egyptian priests say that in their sacred registers there are 
forty-seven of these sepulchres; but in the reign of Ptolemy 
Lagus there remained only seventeen, many of which were 
ruined and destroyed when I myself came into those 
parts."* 

Thebes, in the days of her greatest glory, stretched a 
distance of thirty-three miles along both banks of the Nile. 
The valley of the Nile here widens out so that the arable 
land is twelve miles wide. A volume might be written, de- 
scriptive of the grandeur of the ruins of No. It is to-day 
one vast field of ruins, the most imposing in the world. 
The Coliseum at Rome and the ruins of Baalbec do not 
compare with these. They are the most stupendous ruins 
of the mightiest city of the Ancient World. It was in the 
height of its glory when David reigned at Jerusalem. Lat- 
er Jeremiah and Ezekiel both prophesied against the city, 
and their words, that No shall be "cut* off," "rent asunder,' 
have been literally fulfilled, and Thebes is known only by 
her ruins. 

-Viewed from the river the site of ancient Thebes pre- 
sents the appearance of a wide, mountain-girt valley or ba- 
sin richly endowed with the gifts of never-failing fertility. 
Nature here revels in perpetual youth, while the most enor- 
mous edifices ever reared by mortal hand, though grey, des- 
olate, and succumbing to the common fate of all human 
handiwork, yet compel the admiration of posterity for the 
wonderful race that has left such mighty memorials of its 
existence— memorials that have indeed been injured but 
not annihilated by the flight of thousands of years. The 
*DiodojQus ? Book I, Booth's Translation, 



A Portion of the Temple at Karnac, The Leaning Tower, 



220 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

verdant crops and palms which everywhere cheer the trav- 
eler as soon as he has quitted the desert, the splendid hues 
that tinge the valley every morning and evening, the brill- 
iant, unclouded sunshine that bathes every object in the 
winter season, and the inspiring feeling that every hour is 
enriching the imagination with new and strange pictures, 
wholly prevents in Thebes the rise of that melancholy feel- 
ing which so often steals over the mind in the presence of 
the relics of bygone greatness and of vanished magnifi- 
cence."* 

And what magnificent ruins are here to be seen! 
There are temples and tombs, tombs and temples, multi- 
plied over and over again —the greatest of all, the temple 
of Karnac! It was nearly two miles in circumference. It 
had five entrances, each of which was approached by an 
avenue of two hundred sphinxes. It was surrounded by a 
wall eighty feet high and twenty-five feet thick. It had a 
magnificent gateway or propylon, three hundred and sev- 
enty feet broad and one hundred and forty feet high. Pass- 
ing through the gateway, we enter a vast court or hall of 
columns. One hundred and twenty are standing in the 
court, each sixty-six feet high and thirty-six feet in circum- 
ference. They are all surmounted with beautiful capitals 
and inscribed with hieroglyphics. Here, too, is seen the 
largest obelisk known. . It was cut from the granite quar- 
ries at Syene, is eight feet square and ninety-two feet high. 
But space forbids us to continue. We might write and 
write, and still not complete the description. 

We are fortunate enough to have moonlight on our 
journey up the Nile, and this adds much to the interest and 
pleasure of the journey. Our first view of the ruins of Kar- 
nac is at nine o'clock at night The night is beautifully 

*Baedeker, "Ancient Egypt," page io5, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 221 

bright and clear, such a night as we never see in our north- 
ern latitudes. The moon is shining in all the fullness of 
her glory. We wander through the forest of 'columns with 
our dusky Arab guides. The gloomy shadow cast by wall 
and column is only partly broken by the moonlight. It is 
a wonderful scene and makes a deep impression upon the 
mind. See our engraving, page 216. 

The walls of the temples are covered with sculpture il- 
lustrating scenes in the lives of the Pharaohs. Many of 
them are full of interest, but none more so than the one 
which so remarkably confirms the following Scripture: 
" And it came to pass in the fifth year of king Rehoboam, 
that Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem: 
and he took away the treasures of the house of the Lord, 
and the treasures of the king's house; he even took away 
all: and he took away all the shields of gold which Solo- 
mon had made." 1 Kings 14: 25, 26. 

The scene on the wall, of which we give an engraving, 
represents Shishak king of Egypt returning from his vic- 
torious march against Jerusalem. In his right hand he 
holds a sword, in his left a number of cords to which the 
prisoners are attached. At the lower left-hand corner of 
the engraving may be seen the outline of a number of 
bearded faces. We examined these on the wall very care- 
fully and they are distinctly Jewish. Other portions of the 
Scripture give an account of the expedition and the num- 
ber and names of the kings Shishak subdued. A portrait 
of each king is cut on the wall and the name is attached. 
Among the number is King Rehoboam, bearing the inscrip- 
tion "King of Judah." The figure of Rehoboam has the 
typical Jewish face, and we have here not only a remark- 
able confirmation of the Bible record, but, in all probability, 
a fair portrait of the weak son of the wisest king of Israel 



222 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

We have had but a glimpse at the wonderful ruins of an- 
cient Thebes. The four days spent among her ruined tem- 
ples, her prostrate columns and her magnificent rock-cut 
tombs have been exceedingly interesting. We should like 




Shishak with Jewish Captives. 



to linger here for a month and wander among these won- 
derful ruins, but we must curb the desire. We cannot leave 
Thebes, however, without saying something of our visit to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 223 

the Tombs of the Kings. They are not less wonderful, in 
their way, than the ruins of the old temples. Cut into the 
living rock of the everlasting mountains, they have en- 
dured, while the temples have fallen into ruin. Some of 
them are remarkably well preserved, and are in nearly the 
same condition as when finished by Pharaoh's workmen 
more than thirty centuries ago. 

From Luxor we cross to the west bank of the river in 
an Arab boat. The boat strikes the ground thirty feet 
from the shore. Our method of landing is to mount on the 
shoulders of a native, who safely puts our feet on terra fir- 
ma. The Elder is carried ashore first. It is rather an 
amusing incident. He insists that the writer, with his two 
hundred pounds avoirdupois on the shoulders of an Arab, 
does not present a very dignified appearance. One of the 
Arabs falls, with rather unpleasant results, while carrying 
an English lady ashore. We mount our donkeys, and as we 
ride across the plain we are beset by a number of bright- 
eyed, dusky little maidens, from eight to ten years old, 
each with a water bottle gracefully poised on her head. 
They want to run with us and furnish us filtered Nile water 
on our journey. For this service they expect a piaster or 
two, and the money is well earned. They follow us for 
hours, bearing the bottles on their heads, and only putting 
their hands to them when they run to keep up with the gal- 
loping donkeys. They are bright and intelligent, and have 
picked up a few words of English. 

Our way leads us across the western plains of Thebes, 
once alive with the population of a great city, now a broad 
meadow of the living green of growing crops. It is won- 
derfully fertile and, as far as the Nile waters overflow the 
land, the most luxuriant growth is to be seen. It forms a 
striking contrast with the desert line of sand and desola- 



224 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

tion. We ride by the Colossi of Memnon, two immense 
seated statues fifty-two feet high, which have kept watch 
over the valley of the Nile for thousands of years, passing 
and examining the temple of Rameses II with its prostrate, 
broken statue of that great Pharaoh who knew not Joseph 
and oppressed Israel. This fallen, broken statue was per- 
haps one of the finest works of art in Egypt. It was cut 
from a block of red granite and was fifty-seven and a half 
feet in height, and when finished must have weighed nearly 
nine hundred tons. Fallen and broken as it now is, it still 
remains one of the wonders of Egyptian workmanship, and 
a memorial of the great vanity of the Pharaoh whose image 
it bore. 

Continuing our journey we reach the edge of the fertile 
plain and then, riding a short distance across the desert, en- 
ter the Valley of the Tombs— " The Valley of Death," it 
has been appropriately named. It is a savage, barren 
gorge between two mountains. The desolation and the 
deathlike quiet of the place depress the feelings. Not a 
spear of grass, not a shrub or tree, not a drop of water, not 
a living thing is to be seen in this solitary valley, the en- 
trance to the tombs. 

The tropical sun beats down on our heads with terrible 
power, and we are glad for once to seek the shelter of an 
overhanging rock, which casts a grateful shade. We learn 
to appreciate, more fully than ever before, the meaning of 
the words, - the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." 
We find, too, the advantage of having the little water girl, 
Fatima, with us. The porous earthen bottle keeps the wa- 
ter quite cool. A handkerchief, saturated with water and 
placed on the head, gives much relief as we ride on in the 
glare of the noonday sun. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS 225 

Finally we come to the place of the tombs, the very 
valley of death. The mountain side is literally honey- 




Entrance to the Empty Tomb of Seti I, Father 
of the Oppressor. 



combed with the rocky mansions of the dead. Here the 
Pharaohs of ancient Egypt were laid away " in glory, every 
one in his own house." Isa. 14: 18. 



226 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



"Cased in cedar and shut in a sacred gloom; 
Swathed in linen and precious unguents of old; 
Painted with cinnabar, and rich with gold; 
Silent they rest, in solemn salvatory; 
Sealed from the moth and the owl and the flitter-mouse; 
Each with his name on his brow," 

Here, too, queens and princes, priests and nobles, offi- 
cers and men of wealth were laid away to rest, and their 
tombs were equal in magnificence and splendor to those of 
the Pharaohs. We are in the midst of the tombs of the 
great men and women who lived more than three thousand 
years ago. Great as they were, their bodies have been re- 
moved, and many of them are now on exhibition in Cairo. 
Others are to be seen in the museums of Europe and the 
United States. What a commentary on human greatness! 

Like the tombs at Beni Hassan, which we described in 
a previous letter, the tombs of the kings are entered by a 
corridor, a doorway and a long, descending gallery. The 
walls are covered with hieroglyphics and sculpture, depict- 
ing scenes in Egyptian life. The extent of these rocky ex- 
cavations is really wonderful. The following dimensions 
of one of the larger tombs are given by Manning, and will 
give an idea of the great amount of labor required to pre- 
pare it for its royal occupant. It is eight hundred and 
sixty-two feet in length, without reckoning the lateral 
chambers; the total area of excavation is twenty-three thou- 
sand, eight hundred and nine feet, occupying an acre and a 
quarter of ground, "an immoderate space for the sepulchre 
of one individual, even allowing that the members of his 
family shared a portion of its extent." 

The walls of the tombs are covered with paintings and 
sculpture, and it is really wonderful how well they have 
been preserved. They give a graphic illustration of life 
among the ancient Egyptians. 




Entrance to the Kings' Tombs at Thebes. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 2 2Q 

"We saw here, as in a picture story-book, how the man 
had cultivated his garden and fields, had garnered his har- 
vests, had sent merchandise on the river in boats sailing 
with the wind; how he had gone to battle and taken com- 
mand of armies; the gathering in of his vintage, the games 
and shoutmgs of his wine-pressers, his sports in fishing and 
fowling. Then we saw him.-a picture of easy joy.-fn the 
midst of the family circle. We saw him at the feast; a ues ts 
were at his dwelling; he welcomed them to the merry ban 
quet; slaves crowned them with garlands of flowers- the 
wine-cup passed round. Then there were harpers and mu- 
sicians and players on the double pipes. Girls in Ion- 
wavy hair and light, clinging garments were dancing But 
to all things there comes an end. We saw here, also the 
day (how far back in the depths of time!) when those 
pleasant feasts were all over,-the lilies dead, the music 
hushed, the last of this man's harvest stored, the last trip 
enjoyed by boat or chariot. The fish no more fear him in 
the pools; nor the fowl among the reeds. Here he was ly 
mg under the hand of the embalmers. And next we saw 
him in mummy form on the bier, in the consecrated boat 
which was to carry him over the dark river and land him at 
the gates of the heavenly abode, where the gen,, of the 
dead and Osiris were awaiting him to try his deeds, and 
pronounce his sentence for eternal good or ill."* 

Thus we may read, on the walls of the tombs, the his- 
tory of the life of each one of the great men for whom they 
were excavated. And these faithful representations are 
what make the tombs so interesting and so valuable. We 
have space for only one more illustration from the walls of 

B d°k, ? 15 a SCenC ° f gl ' eat interest t0 the student of 
thejiible^Like the rest, the artist drew it true to life. It 

*" Leisure Hours." 



2 30 WANDERINGS IN BIBLB LANDS. 

is that of a band of slaves engaged in brick-making. The 
taskmaster sits by, staff or whip in hand, superintending 
he woiJ There is no mistaking the faces of the men at 
work They are as distinctly Jewish as is the face of any 
Jew clothing merchant to be seen in any of our cities to- 
day They dig the clay with hoes, tramp and mix it with 
their fit^mould the bricks with their hand. No one 
who sees this painting can doubt for a moment that the ar- 
tist depicted the Semitic race. It is said the Jews neve, 
settled so far up the river as Thebes. This is quite true 
or the Bible informs us that they settled in the Land of 
Goshen But the records of the Pharaoh of the oppression 
show that they were engaged in the quarries at Syene near- 
ly one hundred and fifty miles further south Then too, , 
was not necessary that the Jews should have settled at 
Thebes in order for a representation of their servitude to be 
placed on the walls of the tombs. The artist knew then 
Les He represented a band of them at work making 
bricks He doubtless saw this at Memphis, and depicted 
it on the walls at Thebes. It is an exceedingly interesting 
representation, and shows how the Egypdan taskmasters 
made the lives of the people "bitter with hard bondage m 
mortar, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the 
field: all their service, wherein they made them serve, was 
with rigour." Ex. i: 14- 



CHAPTER XIII. 



The Pharaoh of the Oppression. —Finding his Body— The Arab Broth- 
ers—Photographs of Seti I and Barneses II.— Unwrapping the 
Mummies.— Grave Bobbers.— Isaiah and Seti I.— A Visit to Ah- 
med Abd er-Basul. 

|^JOW well we remember the impression made upon 
^Sff our youthful mind when, in our earliest schoolboy 
$r*&l days, we read the simple yet beautiful story of 
Joseph and his brethren. We remember yet how the tears 
would flow when we thought of the poor boy tern away 
from his home and sold as a slave into the land of Egypt. 
We remember, too, our youthful indignation against the 
Pharaoh who knew not Joseph, and who so grievously op- 
pressed the children of Israel. But in our most extrava- 
gant childish fancies as to what the future might bring, 
we never even dreamed that the day would come when we 
should stand face to face with the cruel oppressor of Israel, 
who said to his servants: "Come on, let us deal wisely 
with them; lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, 
when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our 
enemies, and fight against us, and so get them up out of 
the land." Ex. i: 10. Strange indeed, passing strange, 
that, after thirty-three hundred years have been silently 
told, the body of this Pharaoh should have been found with 
the features of his face so well preserved that the likeness 
between it and the statues of the king erected during his 
lifetime is most striking. 
231 



2^2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Pharaoh is the title by which a long line of the reign- 
ing sovereigns of Egypt was known. It was a title and 
not a personal name. As the rulers of Russia all bear the 
title of czar, and those of Germany that of emperor, so all 
the kings of Egypt bore the general name of Pharaoh; but 
each had a personal name by which he is known in history. 
It is only in the later books of the Bible that the personal 
names of the Pharaohs are given* This and the following 
chapter have to do especially with two of the Pharaohs, the 
oppressor of Israel and the one who ruled when the Lord 
led his people out of bondage. They have been desig- 
nated as the Pharaohs of the Bondage and the Exodus. 

A change of rulers is recorded in Exodus between the 
first and third chapters: "Now there arose up a new king 
over Egypt, which knew not Joseph." Ex. 1 : 8. Then fol- 
lows an account of the oppression of the Israelites, the de- 
cree for the killing of the male children, the birth of Moses, 
the interesting events connected with his early life and his 
flight to the land of Midian. These important events are 
merely touched upon, and then we have the following 
statement: " And it came to pass in process of time, that 
the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed 
by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry 
came up unto God by reason of the bondage." Ex. 2: 23. 
From this it is clear that the Pharaoh who knew not Joseph 
had been gathered to the tomb of his fathers. This king 
is commonly admitted to have been the Pharaoh of the 
bondage. In the third chapter we have an account of the 
calling of Moses. And the Lord said unto him, " Come 
now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou 
mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of 
Egypt." Ex. 3: 10. From this it is equally clear that an- 

* 1 Kings 14: 2S; 2 Kings 23: 29. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



233 



other Pharaoh reigned instead of the one of the oppres- 
sion, and this one is believed to have been the king who 
ruled when Moses led the Israelites out of the land of 
Egypt. 

We give one of the many portraits of Rameses II, the 

Pharaoh of the oppression. Of him Rawlinson says: "He 

seems to have been 

the handsomest of 

all the kings of 

Egypt. A good 

forehead, a large, 

well-formed, slightly 

aquiline nose, a well- 
shaped mouth with 

lips not too full, and 

a thoughtful, pen- 
sive eye, constitute 

a face which, if not 

faultless, is at any 

rate vastly superior 

to the ordinary royal 
type in Egypt, and 
would attract atten- 
tion among any se- 
ries of kings." He 
was a man of great 
physical strength 
and animal courage. 
He was ambitious 
and sought to leave a great name behind him. The numer- 
ous statues of the king bear testimony to this fact. His fa- 
ther, Seti I, the mild king, under whose gentle reign the 
Israelites prospered and multiplied, died and was em- 




Head of Rameses II in Young Manhood. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

balmed and entombed. Then followed the long reign of 
his son "the great Pharaoh," whose reign continued sixty- 
seven years. He ruled Egypt with a rod of iron. He op- 
pressed the Hebrew slaves until their groans and cries 
reached heaven. But "in process of time he died and 
was gathered to the tombs of his fathers. 

Many years ago, in the search for the records of the 
past the tombs of Seti I, Rameses II and Menephthah 
were discovered in the valley of the tombs of the kings at 
Thebes But the bodies had disappeared, and no trace ot 
them was to be found. The tombs had been entered and 
everything movable had been taken out. What had be- 
come of the embalmed bodies of the Pharaohs? Who 
could tell? Was the history, after all, a tradition, and the 
Bible account a myth, as some unbelievers stoutly af- 
firmed? We shall see. 

The question remained unsolved, to all but four men 
until in July, 1881, when the hiding-place was found and 
the bodies taken out. The history of this important dis- 
covery is as interesting and as strange as that of any story 
ever published* 

On the bleak hillside, near the Ramesseum at Thebes 
dwelt an Arab family of four brothers, bearing the name of 
Abd er-Rasul. They followed the business of guides to 
those who visited the ruins of Thebes and sold- antiquities 
more or less valuable to travelers. Almost every traveler 
has a desire to carry with him a relic of the past as a 
souvenir of his journey. In 1871, on the mountain side of 
Deir-el-Bahari, not far from their home, they discovered 
the resting-place of the Pharaohs, but the secret was kept 

body. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 235 

securely locked in the breasts of the brothers. They made 
occasional visits to the place, bringing away each time a 
supply of funeral antiquities which were sold to travelers. 
They sold scarabs, small images, books of papyrus, and 
other articles that had been buried with the bodies of the 
dead. Thus the brothers Rasul profited by their important 
discovery and kept well their secret for ten years. At last 
the officials of the Boolak Museum of Egyptian Antiqui- 
ties at Cairo, seeing the number of genuine articles of un- 
doubted antiquity which returning travelers brought with 
them, suddenly awoke to the important fact that a valuable 
discovery had been made by the Arabs. 

Early in 1881 extreme measures were entered into to 
secure the secret. Numbers of arrests were made without 
avail. Among others, Ahmed Abd er-Rasul was thrown 
into prison at Keneh and subjected to various kinds of tor- 
ture. He was subjected to the bastinado (pounding the 
soles of the feet with a flat board), and although his feet 
were pounded so that he could not walk for several 
months, yet his lips remained sealed. No amount of tor- 
ture could extract the secret from Ahmed. He remained 
in prison four months and was then set at liberty, and the 
authorities knew no more than when they first arrested 
him. 

After his liberation and return to his home, a council 
was held by the four brothers. They discussed the ques- 
tion of what was best for them to do. Some thought the 
danger was now all over; Ahmed thought not; spies would 
be set to watch them and great care must be exercised. In 
the discussion of the question the brothers could not agree, 
and a quarrel was the result. Ahmed knew that, when 
agreement between himself and his brothers was impos- 
sible, the secret was no longer safe. He determined to act 



2 j6 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

accordingly. In the darkness of the night he quietly left 
his home, unknown to the others, and made his way down 
the river to Keneh, the scene of his imprisonment and tor- 
ture He asked to be taken before the Mudir (local gov- 
ernor of the district), and when his request was complied 
with he told the official that he knew the hiding-place of 

the Pharaohs. . . 

The governor telegraphed at once to the authorities at 
Cairo. When the important news was received, Emd 
Brugsch Director of the Museum, scarcely able to credit 
the news, started at once with the government and 
museum steamers for Thebes, where he arrived July 4, 
1881 The next day Ahmed conducted Brugsch and his 
party to the place where the bodies were hidden. They 
crossed the valley of the Nile, and, after a long and tedious 
climb up the western slope of the mountain side, a spot was 
reached where the stones appeared, to an expert observer 
and tomb-searcher, to have been arranged by hand rather 
than scattered by some upheaval of nature. 

Here the Arab guide suddenly stopped and said, 1 his 
is the place " In a short time the stones, which to a cas- 
ual observer looked as if they had not been disturbed for 
centuries were removed and the mouth of a shaft was dis- 
closed Ahmed had not led Brugsch astray. He had re- 
vealed his long-kept secret. Ropes were secured, a heavy 
palm log was laid across the mouth of the shaft, and slow- 
ly the stones were all removed. It was found that the 
shaft was forty feet deep and six feet square. It had been 
cut down into the living rock. . 

By means of a rope Brugsch now went down into the 
shaft Reaching the bottom he found a subterranean pas- 
sage which ran westward twenty-four feet, and then, turn- 
ing northward at a right angle, continued into the heart of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



237 



the mountain. The explorer pressed anxiously forward, his 
torch only dimly lighting the passage in the bowels of the 
mountain. The passage finally terminated in a burial 




The M ummy Head of Seti I, Father of the Pharaoh 
of the Oppression. From a Photograph. 

chamber thirteen feet wide, twenty-three feet long and six 
feet high. It was not a large place, and yet it was large 
enough to hold the treasures so long and so eagerly sought 
for in vain. 

In this secret underground chamber the director found 
piled up, not only the coffin of "the Pharaoh of the op- 



238 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

pression," but the sarcophagi which contained the bodies 
of thirty-eight kings, queens, princes and high priests of 
ancient Egypt. The mountain gave up its dead, and the 
Pharaoh who set hard taskmasters over Israel was taken 
from his second resting-place. It may now be seen by all 

who visit Cairo. 

Herr Brugsch gave the following account of the finding 
of the royal mummies to Mr. Wilson:* " Finding Pharaoh 
was an exciting experience to me. It is true I was armed 
to the teeth, and my faithful rifle, full of shells, hung over 
my shoulder; but my assistant from Cairo, Ahmed Effendi 
Kemal, was the only person with me whom I could trust. 
Any one of the natives would have killed me willingly, had 
we been alone, for every one of them knew better than I 
did that I was about to deprive them of a great source of 
revenue. But I exposed no sign of fear and proceeded 
with the work. The well cleared out, I descended and be- 
gan the exploration of the underground passage. 

-Soon we came upon cases of porcelain funeral offer- 
ings, metal and alabaster vessels, draperies and trinkets, 
until, reaching the turn in the passage, a cluster of 
mummy cases came into view in such numbers as to stag- 
ger me. 

"Collecting my senses, I made the best examination I 
could by the light of my torch, and at once saw that they 
contained the mummies of royal personages of both sexes; 
and yet that was not all. Plunging in ahead of my 
guide I came to the chamber, where, standing against the 
wall and lying on the floor, I found even a greater number 
of mummy cases of stupendous size and weight. 

"Their gold coverings and their polished surfaces so 
plainly reflected my own excited visage, that I seemed to 

*E. L. Wilson, " Through Scripture Lands." 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



239 



be looking into the faces of my own ancestors. The gilt 
face on the outer coffin of the amiable Queen Nefertari 
seemed to smile upon me like an old acquaintance. 

" I took in the sit- 
uation quickly with 
a gasp, and hurried 
to the open air lest 
I should be over- 
come and the glori- 
ous prize still unre- 
vealed be lost to 
science. 

"It was almost 
sunset then. Al- 
ready the odor which 
arose from the tomb 
had cajoled a troop 
of slinking jackals to 
the neighborhood, 
and the howl of hy- 
enas was heard not 
far distant. A long 
line of vultures sat 
upon the highest 
pinnacles of the 
cliffs near by, ready 
for their hateful 
work. 

"The valley was as still as death. Nearly the whole 
of the night was occupied in hiring men to help remove the 
precious relics from their hiding-place. There was but lit- 
tle sleep in Luxor that night. Early the next morning 
three hundred Arabs were employed under my direction — 




Mummy Head of the Pha?'aoh of the 
Oppression. From a Photograph. 



240 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



each one a thief. One by one the coffins were hoisted to 
the surface, were securely sewed up in sail-cloth and mat- 
ting, and then carried across the plain of Thebes to the 
steamers awaiting them at Luxor. 




Ahd er-Rasul, Brugsch Bey, and Maspero. 
(As photographed by E. L. Wilson at the mouth of the shaft at Deir-el-Bahari.) 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



241 



"Two squads of Arabs accompanied each sarcophagus, 
— one to carry it and the other to watch the wily carriers. 
When the Nile overflow, lying midway of the plain, was 
reached, as many more boatmen entered the service and 
bore the burden to the other side. Then a third ^set took 
up the ancient freight and carried it to the steamers. Slow 
workers are these Egyptians, but after six days of hard 
labor under the July sun, the work was finished. 

" I never shall forget the scene I witnessed when, 
standing at the mouth of the shaft, I watched the strange 
line of helpers while they carried across that historical 
plain the bodies of the very kings who had constructed 
the temples still standing, and of the very priests who had 
officiated in them,— the Temple of Hatason nearest; away 
across from Qurneh; further to the right the Ramesseum, 
where the great granite monolith lies face to the ground; 
further south Medineh. Above, a long way beyond, the 
Deir-el-Medineh; and then the twin Colossi, or the Vocal 
Memnon and his companion; then, beyond all, some more 
of the plain, the line of the Nile, and the Arabian hills far 
to the east, and above all, and with all, slowly moving down 
the cliff and across the plain, or in the boats, crossing the 
stream, were the sullen laborers carrying their antique 
burdens. 

"As the Red Sea opened and allowed Israel to pass 
across dry-shod, so opened the silence of the Theban plain, 
allowed the strange funeral procession to pass, and then all 
was hushed again. 

"When we made our departure from Luxor, our late 
helpers squatted in groups upon the Theban side and si- 
lently watched us. The news had been sent down the Nile 
in advance of us, so when we passed the towns the people 
gathered at the quays and made most frantic demonstra- 



2 4 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

tions. The fantasia dancers were holding their wildest or- 
gies; here and there a strange wail went up from the men; 
the women were screaming and tearing their hair, and the 
children were so frightened I pitied them. 

« A few fanatical Dervishes plunged into the river and 
tried to reach us, but a sight of the rifle drove them back, 
cursing as they swam away. At night fires were kindled 
and guns were fired. 

" At last we reached Boolak, where I soon confirmed 
my impression that we had indeed received the mummies 
of the majority of the rulers of Egypt during the eight- 
eenth, nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first dynasties, in- 
cluding Rameses II, Rameses III, King Pinotm, the high 
priest Nebseni, and Queen Nefertari, all of which are ar- 
ranged at Boolak pretty much as I found them in their long- 
hidden tomb. And thus our museum became the third, 
and probably the last, resting-place of the mummy of the 
great Pharaoh of the oppression." 

Such is the interesting account given by the man 
whom the world credits with the finding of Pharaoh's body. 
Ahmed Abd er-Rasul the Arab is under a cloud of suspi- 
cion. He took a few relics from the tomb and sold them. 
The bodies and all their belongings were taken away by 
the director in the interest of science, and the revenue of 
the Khedive is increased twenty-five cents every time a 
traveler goes to see the bodies. Europe has robbed Egypt 
for a hundred years, and the museums in London, Paris, 
Berlin and other cities are filled with her treasures. We 
are glad that these are collected and saved from destruc- 
tion, but let us not be too severe in condemning Ahmed 
Abd er-Rasul. 

When Herr Brugsch reached Cairo with his precious 
cargo of Pharaohs, queens and princes (having passed on 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 243 

the way down the river the site of Memphis, the ancient 
capital of Egypt, where these kings had reigned more than 
three thousand years before) he had it carefully unloaded 
from the steamer and placed in the museum, which was to 
be, for a time at least, its last resting-place. Here the 
bodies were all carefully examined by Brugsch, Maspero, 
and other noted Egyptian scholars, and all doubt as to the 
identity of the bodies was removed, for in black ink, writ- 
ten upon the outer and inner mummy cases by the high 
priests v/ho had superintended the burial, was the record 
testifying to the identity of the royal contents. 

On the first day of June, 1886, the body of Rameses II 
was carefully unwrapped by Prof. Maspero, in the presence 
of the Khedive of Egypt and other distinguished person- 
ages. With a skillful hand the professor removed the 
bandages. On the winding sheet of the mummy, over the 
region of the breast, was also found his name plainly writ- 
ten. In less than half an hour the bandages which were 
wrapped about the body so many centuries ago were un- 
loosed and taken off. When Prof. Maspero removed the 
last bandage the face of the Pharaoh who knew not Joseph, 
and who oppressed Israel, appeared. 

The following careful account of the appearance of the 
body was given in the professor's report: "The head is 
long and small in proportion to the body. The top of the 
skull is quite bare. On the temples there are a few spare 
hairs, but at the poll the hair is quite thick, forming 
smooth, straight locks about five centimetres in length; 
white at the time of death, they have been dyed a light 
yellow by the spices used in embalming. The forehead is 
low and narrow; the brow-ridge prominent; the eyebrows 
are thick and white; the eyes small and close together; the 
nose is long, thin, and arched like the noses of the Bour- 



244 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

bons, and slightly bruised at the tip by the pressure of the 
bandages. The temples are sunken, the cheek-bones very 
prominent, the ears round, standing far out from the head, 
and pierced like those of a woman for the wearing of ear- 
rings. The jaw-bone is massive and strong; the chin very 
prominent; the mouth small, but thick-lipped and full of 
some kind of black paste. This paste being partly cut 
away with the scissors, disclosed some much worn and very 
brittle teeth, which, moreover, are white and well pre- 
served. The mustache and beard are thin; they seem to 
have been shaven during life, but were probably allowed to 
grow during the king's last illness, or they may have grown 
after death. The hairs are white, like those of the head, 
and eyebrows, but harsh and bristly. The skin is of earthy 
brown, spotted with black. 

" Finally, it may be said that the face of the mummy 
gives a fair idea of the face of the living king. The ex- 
pression is unintellectual, perhaps slightly animal; but even 
under the somewhat grotesque disguise of mummification, 
there is plainly to be seen an air of sovereign majesty, of 
resolve, and of pride. The rest of the body is as well pre- 
served as the head; but, in consequence of the reduction of 
the tissues, its external aspect is less lifelike. The neck is 
no thicker than the vertical column; the chest is broad; the 
shoulders are square; the arms are crossed upon the breast; 
the hands are small and dyed with henna; and the wound 
in the left side, through which the embalmers extracted the 
viscera, is large and open. The legs and thighs are flesh- 
less; the feet are long, slender, somewhat flat-soled, and 
dyed like the hands, with henna. The corpse is that of an 
old man, but of a vigorous, robust old man. We know, 
indeed, that Rameses II reigned for sixty-seven years, and 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 245 

that he must have been nearly one hundred years old when 
he died." 

This description will enable the reader to form a very 
fair idea of the appearance of Pharaoh as he looked after 
the wrappings were removed from his body in 1886, and he 
has not changed in appearance since then. At Cairo we 
had plenty of time and a good opportunity to examine 
carefully the Egyptian antiquities, none of which interested 
us more than the great Pharaoh with whom we stood face 
to face. 

Touching the portrait of the king, found among the 
monuments of ancient Egypt, Mr. Paine, an authority on 
the subject, says: 14 In the outline drawing of his counte- 
nance, the artist of more than thirty centuries ago, clearly 
endeavored to trace the very profile which time has dealt 
so tenderly with, and now, in the last days, has unvailed to 
our reverent gaze. Even if his royal name had not been 
written by Pinotem upon his cerements, we would have 
been able readily to recognize, and safely to identify, the 
great Rameses from his monuments." 

We now come to another question, Why were the 
bodies of Pharaoh and the kings, queens, and princes found 
with him, removed from the tombs in which they were 
placed when they died? Why were they hid away in the 
desolate mountain fastness, west of Thebes, to be discov- 
ered by the Arab brothers Rasul? To enter fully into the 
details, which an answer to this question would involve, is 
impossible within the limits of this volume. We can give 
but a brief summary of the causes which led to the removal 
of the bodies from their tombs. 

When the ancient Egyptians buried their dead, they 
placed many things in the tombs with them; among others, 
papyrus rolls on which were written historical sketches, re- 



246 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

ports, stories, etc. These rolls were really the books of an- 
cient Egypt. When the bodies of the kings were found, 
many of these books were also discovered; two of them, 
the one known as the Abbott, the other as the Amherst 
Papyrus, contain the key to the solution of the question. 

It seems from these writings that not many years after 
the death of Rameses II the lawless classes in Thebes com- 
menced to break open and pillage the tombs in order to 
secure the gold, silver and other treasures which they con- 
tained. The Abbott Papyrus contains an account of the ^ 
trial of those who were engaged in these robberies. The 
trial lasted four days, when one of the robbers turned 
state's evidence and made a full confession of how they 
broke into the tomb of King Sevek-em-saf. The transla- 
tion reads as follows: 

" It was surrounded with masonry, and covered in with 
roofing stones. We demolished it and found there the 
king and queen reposing therein. We found the august 
king with his divine axe beside him, and his amulets and 
ornaments of gold about his neck. His head was covered 
with gold, and his august person was entirely adorned with 
gold. His coffin was overlaid with gold and silver within 
and without, and incrusted with all kinds of precious 
stones. We took the gold which we found upon his sacred 
person, as also his amulets, and the ornaments which were 
about his neck, and about the coffin in which he reposed. 
And having likewise found the royal wife, we took all that 
we found upon her in the same manner. We seized upon 
their furniture, their vases of gold, and silver, and bronze, 
and we divided them among ourselves." 

Thus it will be seen that robbing graves for gain is as 
old as the Pharaohs of Egypt. The above confession ex- 
plains two things: it tells why such great care was taken to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



247 



secrete and hide away the small chamber in which the dead 
body was laid to rest, and why the royal mummies were 
not left to repose " each in his own house." When the 
robberies were detected and the robbers brought to justice, 
it was felt that even the tombs of the kings were not safe, 
and at any time these chambers of the dead might be bro- 
ken open and despoiled, and the bodies of the kings de- 
stroyed. The priests of the line of Herhor determined to 
find a place of greater security. 

On the secluded mountain side of Deir-el-Bahari, the 
spot for the hiding-place was sought and found. A shaft 
was sunk forty feet into the living rock, from the bottom of 
which a tunnel led into the heart of the mountain, as de- 
scribed above. The coffins were one by one secretly re- 
moved from the tombs of the kings and carried to the 
lonely mountain side: here they were lowered by ropes to 
the bottom of the shaft and then carried to the inner cham- 
bers and piled up. After the work was completed, the 
shaft was filled with stone, and the loose stones which cov- 
er the hillside were so replaced that one might pass over 
the shaft fifty times without observing it. The priests kept 
their secret well, and it died with them. At last the body 
of Pharaoh had found a resting-place where it remained un- 
disturbed for nearly thirty centuries. Then the hiding- 
place was found, the body taken out and carried to Cairo, 
where it is now exhibited in the Boolak Museum. 

The story of the hiding away and the finding of Pha- 
raoh's body is stranger than fiction, and to the writer it has 
an interest that has been intensely absorbing. The sketch 
is brief, but, brief as it has been given, it has grown too 
long. And yet we must not close it without giving one 
more remarkable result of the finding of Pharaoh's body. 



248 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Isa. 52:4 says: "For thus saith the Lord God, My 
people went down aforetime into Egypt to sojourn there; 
and the Assyrian oppressed them without cause." This 
passage of Scripture seemed difficult to understand. Why. 
or how, could the Assyrian oppress Israel in Egypt? The 
two countries are widely separated, and the statement 
seemed to be out of place. Some were ready to say that 
Isaiah made a mistake. But the monuments of Egypt and 
the finding of Pharaoh's body make the statement plain. 

Seti I, the father of Pharaoh, was of Assyrian extrac- 
tion. His mother Tuaa was from the land whence Abra- 
ham was called. She was a queen of great beauty. In her 
rock-cut tomb at Thebes is a well-preserved portrait of her 
face. It is not Egyptian. "The nose, especially, is 
straight and pointed; the brow is high, implying an intel- 
lect of superior order. Though her lips indicate a loving 
heart, she evidently possessed more of spirit than of gentle- 
ness. The face is that of a very attractive and beautiful 
woman. If Rebekah and Rachel were only half as fair as 
she, they were well worth a journey to Mesopotamia to 
obtain." 

The Pharaoh who oppressed the Israelites, although an 
Egyptian by birth, was an Assyrian by extraction. When 
Isaiah wrote that the "Assyrian oppressed" God's people 
in Egypt, he knew what he was writing about, and those to 
whom he wrote understood it equally well. This is only 
another of the many instances where the excavations and 
discoveries in Egypt show that the Bible account is literal- 
ly true, if we only arrive at a proper understanding of it. 

While at Thebes we had a strong desire to visit the 
Arab Rasul, through whose instrumentality the bodies of 
the Pharaohs were discovered. The dragoman of our party 
seemed averse to going with us. The Egyptian govern- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 249 

ment regards the old man with suspicion, and our dragoman 
was not far from it. Not having the fear of the Khedive 
before our eyes v/e arranged for our visit. The Elder, be- 
ing somewhat indisposed on account of hard work at sight- 
seeing, did not accompany us. We engaged Hassan Ali, 
a native of Luxor, a bright, intelligent Arab, as interpreter 
and guide. Jan. 5, 1893, alone with Hassan we set out for 
the home of Ahmed Abd er-Rasul. On the way Hassan, 
in answer to the question, "What will become of you when 
you die? " said: 

"Hassan good Mohammedan. When he die friends , 
bury him. He hope God let him rest in Paradise. He 
work very much. He drink no strong drink. He tell no 
lie. He speak no bad word. When have no business he 
pray one, two, three times a day. When have plenty 
business, no pray. No time to pray then." 

We had more conversation with him, but this will suf- 
fice. We wondered how many professing Christians there 
are like Hassan Ali, "plenty business, no time to pray." 

We crossed the Nile and rode over the plain of Thebes 
to the Ramesseum, and then leaving the beaten path we 
crossed over a hillside avenue, covered with broken pottery 
of the Roman period. Around us on every side deep holes 
were dug in the ground. They showed where the mummy 
hunters had been at work. In fifteen minutes we came to a 
house much better than the average Arab hut. It was the 
house of Ahmed. Stopping at the door, his brother Mo- 
hammed met us. He rapped on the door and called out 
in a loud voice, to warn the women who were in the room 
to go out. We caught a glimpse of a pair of dark eyes 
peering cautiously around the corner of the house, but they 
vanished quickly when the owner found that she was ob- 
served. This was an excusable bit of womanly curiosity. 



2^0 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The door opened, and a tall, well-built old man of sixty-five 
years, with gray hair and beard, came out. It was Ah- 
med Abd er-Rasul, the man to whom the world is really in- 
debted for the finding of Pharaoh's body. He received the 
visitor with a stately courtesy. Shaking hands warmly, he 
invited us to enter his house. He then brought two chairs, 
the only furniture in the room except a rude table, gave 
one to his guest and took the other himself. His brother 
Mohammed, and his son of the same name, with Hassan 
Ali sat, Arab fashion, on the floor. 

After being seated, we said to Ahmed that we had 
heard of him in far-away America and of the important dis- 
covery he had made, that we had traveled nearly eight 
thousand miles to visit the ruins of Thebes and that we 
were glad to meet him in his own house, where we had 
come to pay our respects to him. This speech having 
been turned into Arabic by Hassan, the Arab replied that 
he was happy because of the visit, that his house was our 
house and that we were most welcome to his home. 

After this Ahmed left the room for a moment, and on 
his return we heard the sound of the pestle in the stone 
mortar and knew that one of his women was pounding the 
Arabian coffee. Not caring especially for the coffee we 
rose to go, but Ahmed insisted that we must drink coffee 
with him. As it would have been a serious breach of Arab 
hospitality to refuse, the request was complied with. 

In about ten minutes he went out again and returned 
with a waiter on which were placed five small cups filled 
with coffee. He handed a cup to us, then placed the wait- 
er on the table and took his chair. His brother Moham- 
med then rose from the floor, handed a cup of coffee to 
Ahmed, gave one to Hassan and to Ahmed's son, and 
took the remaining cup himself. Before drinking the host 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 25 1 

wished us continual good health and prosperity. The cups 
contained about two tablespoonfuls of coffee. It was quite 
as much as we wanted. 

After the coffee drinking was concluded, the host took 
from his clothing a large pouch. From this he took a long 
strip of thin, white paper and a small quantity of tobacco. 
Wetting the paper with his lips, he placed the tobacco on 
it and, rolling it up, made a cigarette which he offered to 
us. We politely informed him that we did not smoke, 
which seemed to surprise him very much. The cigarette 
was lighted, a few whiffs taken and then passed to his 
brother. 

Thinking now that our visit had been extended to the 
limit of propriety, we arose and took our leave. In part- 
ing, Ahmed again thanked us for our visit, shook hands 
warmly and said, " God give you a safe journey to your 
own home and to your wife." As we mounted our donkey, 
he said he wanted us to know that he was very angry with 
those who had treated him so badly in connection with his 
discovery. He sent his brother with us, and we rode away 
and saw no more of Ahmed Abd er-Rasul. 

But this was not to be the last of our visit to the 
Arab's home. On our return from Nubia, ten days later, 
his son Mohammed met us at Luxor, bearing from his fa- 
ther a present of some valuable Egyptian antiquities which 
he handed to us with the good wishes of Ahmed. These 
relics of the past we prize very highly and hope to bring 
them home with us. 



CHAPTER XIV. 



The Pharaoh of the - Exodus. — His Succession to the Throne —His 
Troitblous Reign. — His Son Seti Menephthah made Regent— The 
Testimony of the Monuments— The Death of the Firstborn. — The 
Fleeing Israelites —Pharaoh 's Pursuit — The Destruction of his 
Host. 




y HEN Rameses II died he left behind him a large 
fQjM number of sons and daughters, for, according to 
^sS^ Brugsch and Rawlinson, he introduced the practice 
of polygamy into Egypt. Monogamy, always compulsory 
on private persons, had also been practiced by the monarchs 
until the reign of this king. The monuments tell of a 
prince of the name of Kahmus. He was the favorite son 
of Pharaoh's favorite queen, Isi-nefret, and was to succeed 
him on the throne of Egypt. The young prince was much 
loved by his father. He was made regent and reigned 
jointly with him for a number of years. But the great age 
attained by Rameses II left him still ruler at the death of 
his son, which occurred in the fifty-fifth year of his reign, 
when Prince Kahmus was about fifty* 

Rameses II was succeeded by his fourteenth and eldest 
surviving son, Menephthah II, who is generally believed to 
have been the Pharaoh of the exodus. To the Bible stu- 
dent the life and history of this man are full of interest. 
As Paine says, if we were to choose between the Pharaoh of 
the oppression and the Pharaoh of the exodus, or were 
asked, " Out of the several Pharaohs mentioned in the Bi- 

* " Ancient Egypt," page 337. 

2S2 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 253 

ble, which one above all others would you most wish to 
learn about?" with scarcely a moment's hesitation we 
would answer, "The Pharaoh of the exodus." Not because 
of his greatness, but because he is that one who replied, 
"Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to let Isra- 
el go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go;" * 
that one who required bricks and withheld the straw from 
the already burdened and groaning Hebrews; that one be- 
fore whom the contest by enchantment took place, until 
the magicians gave up, exclaiming, "This is the finger of 
God;" that one who recalled his consent the instant the 
evils were removed; that one who, under all the signs and 
wonders and plagues of Jehovah, hardened his heart up to 
the very entrance of death into his dwelling to lay low his 
cherished firstborn son, the heir to the throne; that one who 
repented having thrust out the bondmen, and pursued aft- 
er them, and overtook them encamping by the sea; that 
one, in fine, upon whose hosts the sea returned to its flow, 
till there remained not so much as one of them.f 

To understand more fully the relations the different 
Pharaohs sustain to each other we must take a glance at 
Egyptian history, so far as it has become a settled record. 
It will be borne in mind that chronologists do not all agree 
in their calculations of the time covered by the Bible 
events. The same is true of Egyptian chronology. As to 
time, Egyptian history may be divided into three great pe- 
riods: first, the ancient monarchy about which very little 
is known, and about which the chronologists differ widely. 
Second, the reign of the shepherd kings, known as the Hyk- 
sos. The history of this line of kings is also enveloped in 
mystery. The monuments and tombs make some disclo- 



*Ex. 5: 2 . 

tPainein the Century for September, 1889. 



2 £4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

sures concerning them, but little is known about them. 
Third, the later monarchy, with Thebes as its capital, which 
comes in contact with the Bible history. 

We have, in our study of the Bible, grouped all we 
know of these three periods around the names of the patri- 
archs Abraham, Jacob, Joseph and Moses. These names 
follow each other in the Bible in such a way that we are apt 
to forget that many years are covered by the Pentateuch, 
and that there is not a continuity in the Bible story. The 
author of the first five books of the Bible did not write a 
history of Egypt, but of the chosen people of God, and he 
briefly alludes to the Pharaohs only when they come in 
touch with the events recorded in the history of the He- 
brews. 

We should bear in mind that the Pharaoh who reigned 
when Abram and his beautiful wife Sarai went down into 
Egypt lived some two hundred years before Joseph became 
the slave of Potiphar; and over a hundred years elapsed 
from the time of Joseph's Pharaoh until "there arose up a 
new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph." In this 
time a number of Pharaohs reigned. According to 
Brugsch, who is an authority on the history of Egypt, fif- 
teen Pharaohs reigned in the four hundred years preceding 
the death of Menephthah II, the Pharaoh of the exodus. 
He gives the following list of rulers for the two hundred 
years preceding the death of the Pharaoh of the oppres- 

1 " Amen-hotep III. Rameses I. 

Seti I. 

Rameses II. 
Menephthah II. 

The same author says: "The new Pharaoh 'who knew 
not Joseph' and who adorned the cities of Rameses and 
Pithom with temples and treasuries, can be no other than 



Amen-hotep IV. 
Horus. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



255 



Rameses II. He is undoubtedly the Pharaoh of the op- 
pression, and the father of that unnamed princess who 
found Moses in the little papyrus bark among the flags of 
the river. . . As Rameses II must be regarded as the 
Pharaoh under whom Moses first saw the light, so the 
chronological relations, — having regard to the great age of 
the two contemporaries, Rameses II and Moses, — demand 
that Menephthah II should, in all probability, be acknowl- 
edged as the Pharaoh of the exodus!'* The general agree- 
ment among Egyptologists as to the Pharaohs of the 
oppression and exodus, with the inscriptions recently dis- 
covered and the finding of the body of Rameses II, leaves 
but little room for doubt on this question. 

The monuments of Egypt are not silent as to the life 
and character of Menephthah II, the vacillating Pharaoh of 
the exodus. While during his troublous reign he did not 
erect great temples and hundreds of statues as his father 
did, yet he has left his record on the temple walls and 
statues of others. At Thebes there is a beautiful statue in 
bas-relief of Menephthah. The engraving which we give is 
from a photograph of the head of the statue which appears 
in outline on page 258. It is said to be a masterpiece of 
ancient Egyptian art and is especially interesting because 
it presents to us the face of the Pharaoh of the exodus. 

Of his reign Rawlinson says: " Inheriting from his fa- 
ther an empire which was everywhere at peace with its 
neighbors, he might have expected to have had a tranquil 
and prosperous reign, and to have carried on the burst of 
architectural energy which had manifested itself under his 
father and grandfather. The power however which directs 
human affairs, wholly disappointed these expectations. 
The unclouded prospects of his early years gave place, aft- 

*Brugsch, "History of Egypt." 



256 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



er a brief interval, to storm and tempest of the most fear- 
ful kind; a terrible invasion carried fire and sword into the 
heart of his dominions; and he scarcely escaped this dan- 
ger when internal troubles broke out, — a subject race, high- 




Menephthah, the Pharaoh of the Exodus. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



257 



ly valued for the services which it was forced to render, in- 
sisted on quitting the land; a great loss was incurred in an 
attempt to compel it to remain; rebellion broke out in the 
south; and the reign, which had commenced under such 
fair auspices, terminated in calamity and confusion. Me- 
nephthah was quite incompetent to deal with the difficult 
circumstances in which he found himself placed; he hesi- 
tated, temporized, made concessions, retracted them — and 
finally conducted Egypt to a catastrophe from which she 
did not recover for a generation."* 

The search among the monuments of ancient Egypt re- 
veals many interesting facts concerning Menephthah II and 
his troublous reign. The question as to whether the antiq- 
uities of Egypt do fully illustrate the life of the man who 
defied the power of God even until his firstborn son was 
slain may be answered in the affirmative. Many of the 
best Egyptian scholars, among whom are Rawlinson, Rob- 
inson, Paine, Brugsch, and others, set forth the history of 
Menephthah in the light of recent discoveries in Egypt. 
To these authors we are indebted for what we here give of 
his life. 

Among the many interesting facts known concerning 
the Pharaoh of the exodus it now comes out that he was se- 
riously troubled in the last years of his reign by a pretend- 
er to the throne. Why should there be a pretender in any 
case, if there was a legitimate heir, the firstborn son of the 
monarch? It almost assumes that there was no such per- 
son, to say that a pretender set up a claim, and, indeed, 
succeeded in obtaining the golden scepter and holding it 
for five years. Put with this the information, supplied by a 
monument preserved in the Berlin Museum, which tells 
that Menephthah II lost a son by a very melancholy and 

♦"Ancient Egypt," pages 337, 338. 



'-58 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



sudden death. Nei- 
ther this nor that 
gives the circum- 
stances, but the fact 
is noted, and the sto- 
ry is silent. That the 
successor of M e- 
nephthah II was 
dead had to be stated 
because of the titles 
in the reigning line; 
but that he died in 
the terrible plague 
of the exodus was 
perhaps too much for 
Egyptian vanity. 
Here the narrative of 
the Inspired Book is 
needed to supple- 
ment a group of sug- 
gest ive facts, and 
connect them so that 
they can be under- 
stood. It was not to 
be expected that any 
mention would be 
made of the ten 
plagues by which 
Pharaoh was brought 
into subjection to Je- 
ll ovah; the details 
were too mortify- 
ing to be related. 




Outline of Statue of Menefihthah at Thebes, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 259 

Think of the humiliation of Pharaoh in having to admit 
that princes of the blood, and maid servants in the houses, 
prisoners in jails, and laborers in the field, even beasts in 
their stalls, must share the same awful stroke of Jehovah's 
wrath; the king must mourn in his grief over his eldest boy, 
as the bereaved beggar mourned over his dead son. There 
would be one common wail of broken hearts throughout 
Egypt. Hence national haughtiness would hush up such 
things. But the Bible gives them: "And it came to pass, 
that at midnight the Lord smote all the firstborn in the 
land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his 
throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was in the dun- 
geon; and all the firstborn of the cattle." Ex. 12: 29.* 

These particulars show a wonderful corroboration be- 
tween the story of the life of the Pharaoh of the exodus, 
as revealed by the monuments of ancient Egypt, and the 
Bible narrative written by Moses. But the references to 
the king and his son who was to have succeeded him on 
the throne of Egypt do not stop here. The agreement be- 
tween the monuments and the Bible will become more 
apparent as we continue, thus affording more abundant tes- 
timony of the truth of the Book of God. 

One among the first things undertaken by a young 
prince was to prepare a sepulchre for his body. The son 
of Menephthah II began such a tomb in the valley of the 
tombs of the kings where his ancestors were laid to rest. 
It was never finished. Champollion, the French Egyptolo- 
gist, says of it: " This poor sepulchral hall was only a cor- 
ridor in the plan, whose extremity lies still in the rough 
rock; and it became the room of the sarcophagus, or funer- 
al chamber, by the accident of the death of the Pharaoh." 
The unfinished tomb and the accident referred to tell us of 

*Robinson. 



260 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



an early and sudden death, and we think at once of the fate 
of the firstborn in Egypt. 

A number of wall tablets have been found in Mount 
Silsilis on which are inscriptions and pictures in bas-relief 
referring to Menephthah II and his son. Paine refers to no 
less than six of these tablets. They set forth that the son 
of the Pharaoh of the exodus was Seti Menephthah; thus 
showing that the young prince bore the names of his great 
grandfather, Seti, and of his father. They also make it 
clear that he was associated on the throne with his father. 
One of the inscriptions speaks in these extravagant terms 
of the young prince: " Crown prince of the palace over the 
two countries, chief of millions, head over hundreds of 
thousands, he who stands in closest relationship to the 
good God, the royal son of his body begotten, beloved of 
him, of royal birth, the chief of the soldiers, the very great 
regent in behalf of him."* Here we are informed that Me- 
nephthah II had made his son regent and that he was asso- 
ciated with his father upon the throne. With these facts in 
the mind let us read the words of the Lord, spoken by the 
mouth of his servant Moses: "About midnight will I go 
out into the midst of Egypt: and all the firstborn in the 
land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that 
sitteth upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the maid- 
servant that is behind the mill; and all the firstborn of 
beasts." Ex. n: 4, 5. The monuments tell us that the 
firstborn son of Pharaoh, the prince Seti Menephthah, sat 
on the throne of his father as associate ruler. The Bible 
refers to him as " the firstborn of Pharaoh that sitteth upon 
his throne." The correspondence between the two is most 
remarkable, and the testimony is complete. 

*Paxne. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 2bl 

The evidence that the firstborn son of the Pharaoh of 
the exodus died very young is not wanting. In the corri- 
dor of the unfinished tomb to which we have referred is a 
statue of the prince in bas-relief. It is remarkably well 
preserved. Providence, who dealt so severely with both fa- 
ther and son, shielded this statue of the son through all the 
centuries that have passed since it was chiseled on the 
walls of the tomb, so that we can see him to-day as he was 
in life. The figure is a masterpiece of beauty. It is full of 
life and expression. The artist who conceived and wrought 
this gem had real genius and great skill. The lineaments 
are full of youthlike tenderness. Way back in those days 
of antiquity the graver knew how to soften rock. 

About the statue are the royal cartouches and beneath 
these are the signs for deceased, " Makheru." These are re- 
peated, and their date must be very nearly that of the 
death of the prince. Had this statue been sculptured any 
length of time before his death, these signs for deceased 
would be absent. Inasmuch as in this instance there was 
no need to make the subject younger than he actually was, 
or more divine, Seti Menephthah could not have been more 
than twenty years of age when he was brought low instant- 
ly, here to be committed to his " eternal home." A por- 
trait statue of Seti Menephthah in middle life or old age 
does not exist* Again we note the wonderful agreement 
between the monuments and the Bible. 

In view of the foregoing facts Paine invites our atten- 
tion to the fact that the antiquities of Egypt, the best 
among authorities, stand ready to teach us: i. That Seti 
Menephthah was the firstborn son of his father. 2. That 
his father lived to a great age. 3. That the son's adminis- 
tration was merely one of regency in behalf of his father. 

*Paine in the Century for September, 1889. 



2 5 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

4. That the son died early, before the father died. It fol- 
lows that Seti Menephthah corresponds to the Biblical (i) 
firstborn son (2) of a living Pharaoh, (3) who sat on his 
throne (4) but died suddenly before his father died. Both 
the Egyptian monuments and the . Hebrew Scriptures de- 
scribe a situation embracing four distinct premises: the 
four are identical in both accounts; the logical conclusion, 
therefore, must be that they relate to the same personage, 
for in the nature of things two series of such identical par- 
ticulars would not occur apart once in many ages. 

There has also come down to us from the ancient 
tombs a papyrus containing a funeral dirge, written on the 
death of Seti Menephthah. Translated it reads as follows: 

" O fan bearer at the right of the king, 
Crown prince in the grand hall of Seb, 
Royal scribe of truth! 

Thy mouth and thy lips were full of health: 
Thou wast in favor with the king all thy life. 
Horus, friend of things that are just! 
Thou shalt dwell a thousand years on the earth, 
Thou reposest upon the mountain 

Whose mistress is on the west of Thebes, in the Necropolis. 

Thy soul is renewing itself among the living, 

And mingling among the perfected spirits. 

Descending into the divine bark, thou are not repulsed, 

Thou passest even to the jaws of the tomb; 

Thou art judged before the deity Osiris; 

Thou art proclaimed righteous." 
And here we may leave the prince who died on that 
night when the angel of death passed over the land of 
Egypt The greatest trial and the darkest hour in the life 
of Menephthah II must have been when his son was strick- 
en dead by the mysterious God of the Hebrews. And who 
can doubt that his own voice went up in the great cry that 
welled forth from desolate homes that dark night in Egypt? 
The king was now an old man, and the blow came all the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



263 



heavier because on his dead boy rested all his hopes of a 
successor to the throne of Egypt. Now his last hope was 
gone. No son of his should sit upon the throne of Kam. 
No wonder that this great calamity broke his proud heart 
and conquered his stubborn will. 

For the time being he is a changed man and he hum- 
bles himself before the God of Israel: "And he called for 
Moses and Aaron by night, and said, Rise up, and get you 
forth from among my people, both ye and the children of 
Israel; and go, serve the Lord, as ye have said. Also take 
your flocks and your herds, as ye have said, and be gone; 
and bless me also." Ex. 12: 31, 32. So the proud king 
submitted and even humbled himself to ask a blessing from 
Moses, the servant of the most high God. 

With the permission, given in the words of a command, 
the men and women who had been slaves for so many years 
fled at once from the land of bondage. Hope ran high and 
joy filled every heart, for at last the Lord had heard their 
cry and was now leading them away from their cruel task- 
masters, away from the land of bondage to the promised 
land of freedom. But the vacillating king had already 
changed his mind. This believer in sorcery, enchantments, 
and in dreams was already saying, "Why have we done 
this, that we have left Israel go from serving us?" He 
doubtless thought of the loss he was sustaining. He saw 
the empty brick-yards, the deserted public works, where 
but yesterday the slaves were toiling by the thousands and 
everything was full of life. Now all is hushed and still. 
The Hebrews are gone. "Why have I done this thing?" 
Menephthah II asks himself again. He forgets the death 
of his son, he makes ready his chariot and pursues the flee- 
ing bondmen, hoping to overtake them and bring them back 
into bondage. Again he is ready to defy the Lord of heav- 



264 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

en and again comes the Divine Hand between Pharaoh and 
the Israelites to save them. The sea is opened, the Israel- 
ites pass through and the army of Pharaoh, following them, 
is overthrown in the waters. "Thus the Lord saved Israel 
that day out of the hand of the Egyptians; and Israel saw 
the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore." Ex. 14: 30. 

Did Pharaoh lead his army into the sea? Did he per- 
ish with them, and if so was his body covered up in the 
sands of the sea? The Mosaic account does not say that 
Pharaoh was drowned. In Psalms 136: 15 we have these 
words: "But overthrew Pharaoh and his host in the Red 
sea;" but the marginal reading gives, as the meaning of the 
Hebrew word, "shook off," instead of overthrow. The Re- 
vised Version gives the same reading. In reading the care- 
ful account written by Moses there is nothing said about 
the destruction of the king. The language used is clear 
and explicit: "And Moses stretched forth his hand over 
the sea, and the sea returned to his strength when the 
morning appeared; and the Egyptians fled against it, and 
the Lord overthrew the Egyptians in the midst of the sea. 
And the waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the 
horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the 
sea after them; there remained not so much as one of 
them." Ex. 14: 27, 28. If Pharaoh had gone in with his 
army and had been drowned, it is not likely that a state- 
ment of the fact would have been omitted from the ac- 
count. It will also be noticed that in the song of Moses, 
sung after the deliverance of the Israelites, no mention is 
made of the death of Pharaoh himself. 

A singular fact is that, when the bodies of the father 
and grandfather of Menephthah II were found at Deir-el- 
Bahari, his body was not found with them. It was not 
found 'in the magnificent tomb that he prepared for it, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 265 

which we visited at Thebes. Why? The question cannot 
now be answered. He may have perished in the Red Sea; 
he may have been entombed and afterwards his body hid- 
den away from the grave-robbers. The question must be 
left in the hands of the excavator. The body of the Pha- 
raoh of the exodus, he who defied the Lord of heaven and 
earth, may some day be found, and we may look upon his 
face. 



CHAPTER XV. 




Farewell to Thebes.-The Temples at Esneh and Edfou.-Assuan and 
the First Cataract. -The Granite Quarries .-The Market-place. 
The Bisharin. -Camel Riding.-The Tropic of Cancer. -Persistent 
Merchants.— The Nilometer.-A Quiet Ride on the Desert.— The 
Famine of the Bible. 

I HE time allotted for our stay at No-amon passed 
quickly away and we leave Luxor reluctantly, feel- 
ing that months might be spent to advantage in ex- 
ploring the mighty ruins of Thebes. We are to spend some 
time here on our return, so we go away, hoping to see more 
of this interesting place. Southward we journey, stemming 
the current of the Nile and occasionally coming to a sud- 
den standstill on some hidden sandbar, recently formed by 
the ever-changing current of the river. Our pilot is watch- 
ful and the measuring pole is constantly in use, but with 
every possible care he fails. The sandbars are hidden by 
the muddy waters and are a source of considerable anxiety. 
Owing to this hindrance, our progress up the river is slow, 
but we suffer no harm, for the engineer clears the boat by 
reversing the engines and backing down stream. 

During the forenoon we have a light shower of rain, 
quite an unusual occurrence in Upper Egypt. Years pass 
here without a drop of rain falling, so that literally the land 
here drinks not ''the water of the rain of heaven." The 
great deserts on either side of the Nile valley are without 
moisture. Clouds do not form and the land is without 



rain. 

266 



. WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 267 

Our first stop after leaving Thebes is at Esneh, where 
there is a temple which has only recently been excavated. 
Centuries ago the sands of the desert, drifting over the edi- 
fice, covered it up and preserved from vandalism its beauti- 
ml sculptures and paintings. Compared with Thebes, the 




2 68 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

temple at Esneh is of modern construction, for it was built 
at the beginning of the Christian era and bears the name 
of several Roman emperors. The interior is beautiful. 
The capitals of the columns bear the palm leaf instead of 
the lotus. The colorings on the walls are as fresh and 
bright as if they had been laid on but a few years ago. 
Our engraving shows the interior construction of the tem- 
ple. " 

After our visit to the interesting temple we are fol- 
lowed to the boat by more than a hundred men and boys 
begging for backsheesh. Their dwelling-place is in the vil- 
lage of Esneh and they hail the arrival of the traveler with 
delight, for they usually succeed in securing some money 
as a result of their begging. After we had regained the 
boat the crowd stood on the steep banks, shouting back- 
sheesh at the top of their voices. Some of the passengers 
threw small pieces of money among them and then the 
rush and struggle for the coins became furious. At times 
a half dozen boys were piled together, pushing and pulling 
with all their strength and shouting at the top of their 
voices in the struggle to gain the coveted prize. Half 
naked when the struggle began, they were soon divested of 
all their clothing. When one would finally secure the 
piece of money it was quickly placed in the mouth. Sever- 
al of the masses of shouting, struggling men and boys 
rolled down the steep bank into the river. It was a furious 
mob and was only dispersed after the boat had pulled away 
from the shore. Even then the crowd ran along the shore 
shouting backsheesh, backsheesh, and the last faint sound 
that was wafted to our ears across the waters of the Nile 
from Esneh was b-a-c-k-s-h-e-e-s-h. 

This incident was not only amusing but instructive as 
well. All over the world the love of money is common to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 269 

humanity. The desire to get gain crops out on all sides. 
In our great commercial centers are organized boards of 
trade. The writer has witnessed fully as much excitement 
and heard as much shouting and yelling on the Chicago 
Board of Trade when the corn market was cornered as was 
heard among the Arabs at Esneh. The only real differ- 
ence in the two crowds was that of culture. Both had the 
same object in view, the getting of money, and when the 
superior advantages of civilization are taken into considera- 
tion it remains to be said that the Esneh crowd will com- 
pare favorably with that of the Chicago Board of Trade. 

At Edfou we stop for the night. We are now five hun- 
dred and fifteen miles south of Cairo and are nearing the 
first cataract. At Edfou is perhaps the best preserved 
temple in Egypt. In 1864 it was excavated by Mariette 
Bey. Prior to that time it was hidden beneath the sand 
and an Arab village stood above its walls and sanctuary. 

The temple at Edfou was begun under the reign of 
Ptolemy Euergetes I, B. C. 237, and was completed B. C. 
57. Thus one hundred and eighty years were spent in the 
construction of this magnificent structure. Our engraving 
shows the pylon in front, the open court in the center and 
the covered chambers and sanctuary in the rear. The 
space enclosed by the walls measures four hundred and 
fifty by one hundred and twenty feet. 

Very early in the morning of our twelfth day on the 
Nile we leave Edfou and, passing Silsilis, where are the 
tablets referring to the reign of Menephthah II, to which 
we called attention in a preceding chapter, and Kom Om- 
bo, where there is a temple dedicated to the crocodile god 
of ancient Egypt, we proceed at once to Assuan, at the 
first cataract, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 2JI 

Before reaching the first cataract the scenery along the 
Nile changes. The country is more hilly and rolling, and 
" instead of flat, monotonous banks of sand and mud, we 
have masses of rock broken up into grotesque and fantastic 
forms. Groves of palm, mimosa, and castor-oil plant come 
down to the water's edge. The limestone and sandstone 
ranges which we find in the Nile valley from Cairo to Silsilis, 
here give place to granite, porphyry and basalt. The islands 
in the stream are no longer shifting accretions of mud alter- 
nately formed and dissolved by the force of the current, 
but rocks and boulders of granite, which rise high above 
the river and resist its utmost force." The water rushes 
and foams about the base of these granite formations and 
with a rapid descent forms what is known as the first cata- 
ract. It is in no sense of the word a waterfall, but simply a 
rushing, rapid descent of the river. The small Nile boats 
are taken up the rapids to the smooth waters above the 
cataract. 

We have now reached the border-land of Nubia. 
Egypt, the kingdom of the Pharaohs, is left behind us. 
We stand on the line between Upper Egypt and the Ethio- 
pia of the Bible. It was of this very place that the proph- 
et spoke when he said, " Behold, therefore I am against 
thee, and against thy rivers, and I will make the land of 
Egypt utterly waste and desolate, from the tower of Syene 
even unto the border of Ethiopia." Ezek. 29: 10. 

Assuan lies on the east bank of the Nile, partly on the 
narrow strip of fertile land and partly on a hill. The date 
palm grows to perfection here, and the fruit is noted for its 
excellent quality. We never ate finer dates than those 
grown here. The city contains a native population of 
about ten thousand souls, but was at one time much larger. 
The Arabian historians record the fact that at one time 



2*J2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

twenty thousand people died here of the plague. The an- 
cient name of the place was Syene, and it was known by 
this name in Bible times. 

It was near this place that the quarries of the famous 
syenite were located. Here the great obelisks, the facing 
of the pyramids, the granite coffins and the statuary of the 
Pharaohs were cut, and then floated down the river on rafts 
to the places where they were used. In the quarry, partly 
covered with sand, is an immense obelisk, which the an- 
cient stone-cutters partly finished and then, for some cause 
unknown to the world to-day, rejected and left in its unfin- 
ished state. The granite took its name from the place 
where it was quarried —Syene,— and is known all over the 
world now as syenite* Some of the granite found here is 
susceptible of a very high polish. We gathered, for some 
friends at home who are especially interested in the study 
of geology, a few pieces that had been chipped off by the 
ancient workmen. We shall visit the quarries again and 
have more to say of them. Assuan is the center of a great 
traffic with the interior of Africa. Great caravans arrive 
from the desert, bringing ostrich feathers, ivory, india rub- 
ber, senna, tamarinds, wax, skins, horns, spears, dried dates 
and other merchandise. The camels are unloaded and 
then, after a few days' rest, are loaded with cotton cloth, 
prints, beads, guns, powder, and other manufactured arti- 
cles for barter with the native tribes of the interior. An 
open space outside the town serves as a market-place and 
storehouse. Here Arabs, Turks, Ethiopians, Nubians, 
Abyssinians and Negroes from central Africa meet on a 
common level and perfect equality. It is noticeable here 
that the color of a man's skin is not set down as an objec- 
tionable feature, and, be he white or black, so long as he 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



273 



conducts himself in accordance with the standard rules of 
society^he is considered a man. 

We walk through the open market-place, and it is full 
of interest to us. Here are groups of merchants buying 
and selling their wares. Here and there are bales of goods 
around which women and children are lounging in their 
quaint costume, which is noted for being extremely scanty. 
Fires are kindled and cooking is being done, for the mer- 
chants and their families eat and sleep by their , goods. In 
this market-place one may purchase for a small sum of 
money any of the products of central Africa. Do you 
want a huge elephant tusk, valuable for its ivory? Here 
you can find it. Would you purchase beautiful ostrich 
feathers? Here they are, — white, grey or black, to suit 
your taste. Then there are ebony war clubs, poisoned ar- 
rows, mounted spears, shields made of rhinoceros hide, 
fans, silver rings and armlets, ivory hoops, all of which are 
for sale. And here you may see strange birds and mon- 
keys, and sometimes young lions, all brought from the inte- 
rior of Africa. Mr. Manning was offered a lion cub for 
seventy-five dollars. The owner, not finding a purchaser at 
that price, gradually came down to twenty. " It was a 
good tempered little brute, playing about like an over- 
grown kitten, but an angry growl and an ominous showing 
of the teeth gave warning of trouble at no distant period." 

At Assuan we saw a number of an African tribe called 
Bisharin. A short distance from the city there is a village 
of these peculiar people. They live in the most primitive 
style, without houses or tents. A few pieces of matting 
made of palm leaves and supported by sticks afford them 
all the shelter they have. As it is quite warm here, even 
in midwinter, and never rains, the matting answers a good 
purpose as a shade in midday. We took with us an 



2^4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Abyssinian who spoke a little English and visited the Bis- 
harin village. The people were quite friendly and were not 
averse to talking, but, owing to the fact that our interpreter 
had but a limited knowledge of their dialect, our conversa- 
tion was quite limited. The young boys and girls, with 
their sparkling black eyes, their beautiful, ivory-like teeth, 
and their brown skin, were really handsome, but the men 
and women, owing to the, hideous manner of wearing the 
hair and grinning, were far from beautiful. 

At one place a woman was grinding alone at a mill 
very similar to the hand-mills used in Palestine. She kept 
on at her work and when I stooped down and took up a 
little of the coarse meal in my hand she offered an objec- 
tion. I then showed her a piece of money, but she seemed 
to have no disposition to be friendly. One of those who 
were standing by ran away and in a few minutes returned 
with a handful of the meal, for which I gave her the piece 
of money. The people came around me in a crowd and 
were much interested in examining my pocket compass and 
watch. The ticking of the watch pleased and interested 
the men and women as much as it does our children, and 
the movement of the magnetic needle was a source of great 
wonder to them. 

A camel ride was enjoyed, or rather endured, during 
our stay at the first cataract. At the pyramids we rode a 
camel for a short distance on the desert, but our first real 
experience of this kind of travel was at Assuan. The 
camel is the common beast of burden in Egypt. His home 
is on the sands of the desert, and he is peculiarly adapted 
to his home. He can travel for days without water or 
food, but he does not do it without protest. Camels are 
natural growlers. As they come and go, heavily burdened 
and with their long necks craning forward, they keep up a 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 2^5 

chorus of short grunts and growls. This seems to be their 
only consolation. They are cross and do not show any 
signs of affection for their drivers. On the contrary, they 
will give them a vicious nip if a favorable opportunity 
offers. They kneel down when they receive their burden, 
and again when they are to be unloaded. 

When we were seated on the back of the kneeling an- 
imal the driver said, " Look out," and suddenly the camel 
lifted its rear to a standing posture, throwing us violently 
forward. It required a tight grip to keep from being 
rolled off in the sand. Then a sudden jerk brought the 
animal on all fours, and we set off for a ride on the "ship 
of the desert." The camel has a peculiar gait, which has 
been called a corkscrew motion, and is caused by the ani- 
mal lifting both feet on the same side at the same time. 
The motion is very tiresome, and after a time becomes ex- 
ceedingly painful. The rider must learn to sway his body 
with the peculiar motion of the camel. Until he does this, 
there is nothing so fatiguing as riding of this kind. The 
Elder assured the writer that he felt the effects of his 
camel ride for some days, and wanted no more of it. 

The following from a writer who has made a study of 
the camel is somewhat lengthy, but it is worth preserving: 
"Its long neck is elevated and stretched forward. It is 
carrying its head horizontally, with its upper lip drawn 
down. In this drawn-down lip, and in its whole demeanor, 
there is an expression of contempt,— contempt for the 
modern world. You can read its thoughts. ' I belong,' it 
is saying to itself, for it cares nothing about you, still you 
can't help understanding it, 4 1 belong to the old world. 
There was time and room enough then for everything. 
What reason can there be for all this crowding and hasten- 
ing? I move at a pace which used to satisfy kings and 



2y6 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

patriarchs. My fashion is the old world fashion. Rail- 
ways and telegraphs are nothing to me. Before the pyra- 
mids were thought of, it had been settled what my burden 
was to be, and at what pace it was to be carried. If any of 
these unresting pale faces (what business have they with 
me?) wish not to be knocked over, they must get out of 
the way. I give no notice of my approach; I make way for 
no man. What has the grand, calm old world come to? 
There is nothing now anywhere but noise and pushing and 
money-grabbing;' and every camel that you will meet will 
be going the same measured pace, holding its head in the 
same position, drawing down its lip with the same con- 
tempt, and soliloquizing in the same style." 

The ancient astronomers made Assuan noted because 
they claimed that it was situated on the Tropic of Cancer 
and that it was here that, on the longest day of the year, 
the rays of the sun fell vertically. It was also stated that 
there was a famous well here into which the sun, at the 
same season of the year, was said to shine and illuminate it 
at every part. The ancient astronomers must have been 
mistaken or else the circle has changed, for it has been 
found by accurate measurement that the Tropic of Cancer 
is nearly half a degree south of this place. 

Nearly opposite Assuan is the Island of Elephantine. 
Soon after our boat was made fast at the landing-place we 
entered small rowboats and crossed to the island. No 
sooner had we landed than we were surrounded with itiner- 
ant merchants, each pressing us to buy his wares. So per- 
sistent were they that it was simply impossible for us to 
move. Matcour and Gladius, our dragomen, came to the 
rescue and drove the merchants away by a vigorous use of 
their heavy whips; but they returned again and again, and 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 277 

we did not get rid of them until we entered our boats again 
and rowed away from the shore. 

On the island is an ancient Nilometer which we exam- 
ined with interest. It is used to ascertain the rise of the 
river. Strabo says of it: "The Nilometer is a well upon 
the banks of the Nile, constructed of close-fitting stones, 
on which are marked the greatest, least, and mean risings 
of the Nile; for the water in the well and in the river rises 
and subsides simultaneously. Upon the wall of the well 
are lines which indicate the complete rise of the river, and 
other degrees of rising. Those who examine these marks 
communicate the result to the public for their information. 
For it is known long before, by these marks, and by the 
time elapsed from the commencement, what the future rise 
of the river will be, and notice is given of it. This informa- 
tion is of service to the husbandmen with reference to the 
distribution of water; for the purpose also of attending to 
the embankments, canals, and other things of this kind. It 
is also of use to the governors, who fix the revenue; for the 
greater the rise of the river, the greater it is expected will 
be the revenue." As it was a thousand years ago, so to-day 
the Nilometer is carefully examined, and the taxes on the 
land are fixed according to the rise of the river. 

From Assuan to Philas, a distance of about eight miles, 
the Egyptian government has constructed the narrow 
gauge railway by which freight and passengers are carried 
around the first cataract. The steamers cannot ascend the 
rapids. The Elder and others of the party, who are to go 
with us to the second cataract, prepare to take the train; 
but the writer, having so much of that kind of travel at 
home, decides to go by donkey. It is a pleasant and com- 
fortable way of traveling, and then one likes to be alone 
sometimes. We select, a trusty, sure-footed little donkey 



278 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



and, with a Nubian boy who speaks no English, set out very 
early in the morning on our ride. We ride over to the 
granite quarries, and spend some time inspecting the work 
of the ancient masons and stone-cutters. From the records 
there is little doubt that the Pharaohs sent many of the 
sons of Jacob here to cut and polish stone for the temples 
in Lower Egypt. They have left distinct traces of their 
work behind them. All the blocks of granite, the casing 
of the pyramids, the pillars, columns, obelisks and statues 
which we have already seen came from this quarry. 

The method in which the blocks were quarried out one 
above the other is still to be distinctly seen on the face of 
the cliff. The skill with which huge masses of granite were 
detached from the face of the cliff to which they belonged 
and handled without injury is absolutely marvelous. The 
obelisks were completely finished on three sides before 
they were finally detached from their native rock. This 
was done by boring numerous holes along a fixed line and 
then driving in wooden wedges and pouring water on them. 
In this manner the great masses were split from the face 
of the cliff. These ancient stone-cutters also understood 
the art of splitting stones by heat.* 

From the granite quarries we ride out on the broad, 
sandy desert and continue our journey alone. We have a 
delightful ride and enjoy the solitude of the sandy waste. 
It is a time for thought and meditation, and who will be 
surprised to know that our mind is not in the desert, but 
with loved ones at home! Shall we be permitted to see 
them again? God knows. To him we commit all our 
ways and he will order all things well. 

In due time we reach the landing-place for the steam- 
ers, opposite Philae, where the steamer Oonas is moored. 

* " Upper Egypt," page 277- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 2^9 

She is to take our little party to Wady Haifa and back. 
We dismiss donkey and boy after giving the latter a couple 
of piasters as backsheesh. It matters not that a contract 
was made for the donkey and the full price paid, the back- 
sheesh is sure to be demanded, and custom has made a law 
which says it must be paid. The working of the oriental 
mind in regard to this giving of money, in addition to the 
contrast, is peculiar. On one occasion we made a contract 
with a guide to furnish boat and donkeys for a certain 
price. It was one dollar more than the regular price as we 
afterwards learned. When payment was made the back- 
sheesh was demanded and had to be paid. 

Between Assuan and Philae is the little Island of Sehel, 
noted for the numerous inscriptions found on the granite 
rocks. Here, on the sixth of February, 1889, Mr. Wilbur 
was fortunate enough to find an important granite column 
nine feet high, standing above the water, and in full view 
when one is going toward Phil*. On it is an inscription 
in hieroglyphics, consisting of thirty-two lines, which form 
an important document. It contains information concern- 
ing a famine which lasted seven years, and was occasioned 
by the failure of the Nile to overflow the land. The sec- 
ond line translated reads thus: "By misfortune the very 
greatest; the Nile has not come forth during a period of 
seven years. Scarce was grain, lacking was vegetable food 
There was a dearth of everything which man ate " The 
inscription further states that in this time of distress 
Pharaoh sent a messenger to the governor at Phil*, telling 
him of the famine and of the want and suffering among the 
people, and inquiring about the source of the Nile and 
about the god who presided over it. He promised to 
faithfully worship the deity of the Nile if he would 
henceforth make the waters overflow the land and yield 



2 g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

full harvest again to the people. It * also states that 
after the return of the messenger to the king he immediate- 
ly ordered rich sacrifices to be made to the god of the Nile 
and decreed that tithes of all that grew on the land should 
be sent to his temple. 

Of course this inscription brings to mind the interpre- 
tation of Pharaoh's dreams by Joseph. He foretold the 
coming of the years of great plenty and the years of fam- 
ine and was appointed by Pharaoh to lay up grain against 
the famine. At El Kab an inscription has been discovered 
which doubtless refers to these years of famine. The 
Pharaoh for whom it was inscribed by Baba speaks thus: 

" I loved my father; I honored my mother; my broth- 
ers and my sisters loved me. I went out of the door of my 
house with a benevolent heart; I stood there with a re- 
freshing hand; splendid were my preparations of what I 
collected for the festal day. Mild was my heart, free from 
violent anger. The gods bestowed upon me abundant 
prosperity on earth. The city wished me health and a life 

full of enjoyment My words may seem a jest 

to a gainsayer. But I call the God Mentre to witness that 

what I say is true / collected com as a friend 

of the harvest God. I was watchful at the time of sowing. 
And when a famine arose, lasting many years } I distribut- 
ed CORN TO THE CITY EACH YEAR OF THE FAMINE." 

Of this remarkable inscription Brugsch says: "Now, 
since families succeeding one another are of the very great- 
est rarity in Egypt, and Baba lived and worked under the 
native King Seqeuen Ra Taa III, in the ancient city of El 
Kab, about the same time during which Joseph exercised 
his office under one of the Hyksos kings, there remains, for 
a satisfactory conclusion, but one fair inference: that the 
< many years of famine' in the inscription must correspond to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS 28I 

seven years of famine under Joseph's Pharaoh, who was 
one of the shepherd kings." 

The inscriptions at Sehel and El Kab may or may not 
refer to the famine recorded in the Bible, with which 
Joseph and his brethren were so closely connected, and 
which had such a wonderful influence upon their lives. 
We see no reason why the conclusion of Brugsch may not 
be correct, and yet, if it is not, the inscriptions do show 
that the Bible narrative is fully in line with the conditions 
which existed in Egypt at the time the account was writ- 
ten. Hidden away under the mud of the Nile or the shift- 
ing sands of the desert, for thousands of years, these 
evidences of the truth of God's Book are being brought to 
light to-day, when they are most needed to meet infidelity, 
and we may expect even more wonderful results in the fu- 
ture than have been obtained in the past. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



tr 

The Oonas -Our Party far the Second Cataract— Abyssinian Sol- 
dZT-Tk^DervislLThe Land of Cush.-TheNubutns.-Curr- 
Z Fashions and 

Sacred Crocodile.-Kalabshi and the Tro P zc ofCancer.-Dekkeh. 
Our Boat Aground.-Korosko. -General Gordon. 

HE steamer Oonas is but a small stern-wheel boat, 
with accommodations for but a very few passengers. 
Our party for the second cataract is not large, but 
- pleasant and companionable. Among the number 
were L D M. Sweat and wife of Portland, Maine, an ex- 
nrember of Congress; Mr. Agnew, an English gentleman. 
Judge Lea of London, and an Australian. Going on board 
the boat we noticed a half score of soldiers with arms and 
accoutrements. They were Abyssinians in the service of 
the Egyptian government. They were fine, soldierly- 
o king" men with skin as black as coal. Their aces were 
deeply scarred, and they looked fierce and warlike Our 
first impression on seeing them was that we were taking a 
»£ad of soldiers to join their comrades at Wady Haifa, 
where there is an army of occupation; but we had not gon 
far before we learned that the soldiers were sent with us as 
a guard. It was not considered safe for travelers to go to 
the second cataract without having such a guard. At Cairo 
we had been fully assured by the authorities that it was en- 
tirely safe to go to Wady Haifa; but now we learned that 
ft was far from safe, and the soldiers on board the boat were 
a constant reminder that we were in an enemy s country. 




282 



■ Wanderings in bible lands. 283 

Had we known of the dangers of the trip, our journey 
would have ended at Assuan. As it was we were steaming 
southward to Wady Haifa and must make the best of the 
situation. 

Since 1885, when General Gordon and his men were 
massacred at Khartoum, the followers of the Mahdi as 
their false prophet is called, have made raids on the en- 
campments along the upper Nile. Only two weeks before 
we made our trip a band of these warlike Dervishes made 
an approach at Wady Haifa, killed about one hundred men 
and then escaped into the desert. They know the desert 
so well that escape for them is easy. Pursuit is almost use- 
less, for it is impossible for an army to march across these 
sandy plains. This accounts for the unsafe condition of 
the Nile between the first and second cataracts and for the 
soldiers on board our little steamer. The men were well 
armed and looked as if they would be able to repel an at- 
tack; but we hoped we might be allowed to finish our jour- 
ney in peace. We could not, however, free ourselves from 
more or less anxiety. 

From the first cataract southward the valley of the 
Nile narrows, and at many places the river is shut in by the 
rocky cliffs on either side. At other places the yellow 
sand of the desert comes down to the very banks of the 
stream, leaving on the steep side of the bank only the nar- 
row strip which is cultivated. The farmers here plant their 
lentils and beans down the steep bank to the very water's 
edge. As the water recedes, they follow it with a succes- 
sion of plantings. Strip after strip of wheat, barley, lentils 
and beans is thus planted, and while the upper strip is blos- 
soming and throwing out heads, the one- next the river is 
just coming through the ground and putting forth the first 
blades. Between the upper and lower strip are all the in- 



284 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

termediate degrees of growth. The banks of the river, 
where they are thus cultivated, present a very beautiful ap- 
pearance, being in many places covered with rich green to 
the very edge of the water. 

The population is scanty. There are said to be about 
four thousand inhabitants between the first and second cat- 
aract. The narrow strip of soil is wonderfully productive, 
but artificial irrigation is mere needful than in Lower Egypt, 
and the sakkieh and shaduf are to be seen all along the riv- 
er banks. At one place, standing on the stern of the 
Oonas, we counted no less than twenty-three sakkiehs in 
operation at one time. The Nubians are profuse in the use 
of castor oil on their persons, "but do not seem to think it at 
all necessary to oil the bearings of their creaking water- 
wheels. The creaking and groanings of a dozen sakkiehs, 
interspersed with the mournful and monotonous song of 
the fathers of the shaduf, may be heard day and night 
along the Nile in Nubia. After spending a sleepless night 
or two on account of the creaking wheels the sound be- 
comes anything but musical to our ears. 

The landscape changes and assumes a more tropical 
appearance as we journey southward. The doom palm 
which we first saw at Thebes is now quite common. Fields 
of cotton, sugar cane and other tropical products line the 
banks of the river, and such is the wonderful fertility of the 
soil that by proper irrigation it produces three harvests a 
year. Little cultivation is needed. The women and chil- 
dren work in the fields, the men are either at work raising 
the water from the river or lounging beneath the shade of 
the palms. At noonday the rays of the sun beat down up- 
on us with great force, and it is as warm here in the middle 
of January as it is at home in July and August. We won- 
der what the heat must be in midsummer, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 285 

We are now in the land of Cush and Ethiopia of the 
Bible. In more recent times it has been, and is still, called 
Nubia. We are really in Africa. There can be no mistake, 
for the Ethiopian cannot change his skin, and he bears the 
same color to-day that he had when the Bible was written. 
Then here are the dome-shaped huts with which Stanley's 
pictures have made us familiar. Occasionally we see a na- 
tive in the picturesque Nubian costume with spear in hand. 
He looks fierce enough, with frightful scars on his face, but 
he is bent on a peaceful mission. He wants to exchange 
his spear for a few silver shillings, the value of which he 
has learned. 

The Bible frequently makes mention of Nubia, or Ethi- 
opia, as it was then known. Job, speaking of the priceless 
value of wisdom, says, "The topaz of Ethiopia shall not 
equal it,"* and the Psalmist says that "Ethiopia shall 
stretch out her hands to God." f May not this prophecy 
have been literally fulfilled in the conversion and baptism 
of "a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under 
Candace queen of Ethiopia" J by Philip? Speaking of 
Thebes, at that time the great capital city of Egypt, the 
prophet also says, " Ethiopia and Egypt were ' her 
strength." § Then, too, Ezekiel prophesies against Ethio- 
pia, declaring that there shall be great pain in that coun- 
try, that the people shall be slain, and that desolation shall 
come upon her.|| The words of the prophet have been lit- 
erally fulfilled, for Ethiopia is desolate and the very name 
of the country has been changed. 

Though Nubia did not form a part of Egypt proper, 
yet, at the present day, it more closely resembles the 
Egypt of the Pharaohs than does the region of the lower 

*Job 28: 19. fPsalms 68: 31. }Acts 8: 27. 

§Nahum 3: 9. ||Ezek. 30: 4, 7. 



286 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Nile. Cut off from the rest of the world by the cataract on 
the north, and by the desert on the east and west, its popu- 
lation has been kept pure from the intermixture of foreign 
blood, and its manners and customs have remained almost 
unchanged. Faces are depicted on the monuments which 
might pass for portraits of those we see around us. The 
contour of the features is precisely the same. This likeness 
is rendered more obvious by a similarity in the mode of 
dressing the hair, which is arranged in small corkscrew 
curls, kept close to the head by saturation with castor oil. 
The necklace, earrings and bracelets are the same as those 
worn three thousand years ago. In any Nubian hut may 
be found wooden pillows or head-rests whose form is abso- 
lutely ^indistinguishable from that of those to be seen in the 
British Museum, brought there from the Theban tombs * 

The wonderful likeness between the Nubians of to-day 
and those whose faces were chiseled on the walls of the 
temples thirty-five centuries ago was illustrated at the tem- 
ple at Abou Simbel in Nubia. One of our attendants who 
carried a torch stood by our side while we examined the 
faces on the wall. The faces on the wall at one or two 
places bore such a striking likeness to the torch-bearer at 
our side that we felt for a moment that one of the ancient 
Egyptians stood by our side. 

At Kalabshi there is a large Nubian village and we go 
ashore to study the home life of the Ethiopian and Cushite. 
They are quite friendly and treat us with a courtesy hard- 
ly to be expected. The pests of all warm climates, the 
vermin, fairly revel in these African huts. We walk 
through the dirty, narrow streets, go into the huts and see 
the Nubian at home. Their houses are entirely devoid of 
carpet. They sleep on the ground; and squatting around a 

*"The Land of the Pharaohs," page 154. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



287 



large, earthen bowl, filled with porridge made of lentils or 
beans, with a bit of cake in their hands, they eat their scan- 
ty meals. Spoons are useless when fingers are so handy. 
They all dip into the same dish, and are not so particular 
as to a little dirt. Fire, except for cooking, is not used. It 
is so warm even in midwinter that there is no necessity for 
it. The women wear the nose-ring, which looks odd 
enough, but they seem to be equally surprised to see our 
ladies with rings in their ears. It is a mere matter of taste 
and fashion after all. 

Clothing is not a question of much concern among 
them. The men who work in the field and at the shaduf 
lay off the shirt-like outer garment and wear only the cloth 
folded and wrapped about the loins. The women wear a 
sort of tunic, something like a large sheet folded about the 
body and looped up on the shoulders, leaving the arms 
bare. Children go unclothed, but as they grow older wear 
a short, fringed skirt of leather, cut into strips and deco- 
rated with beads and cowry shells, tied about the loins. 

In our walk through the village we saw a woman pre- 
paring dough, to be made into thin cakes and baked on flat 
stones which had been heated in the fire. She had in front 
of her a flat stone about two feet long and one foot wide, 
which constant use had worn quite smooth and slightly hol- 
low in the middle. In her hand she held a flint stone, flat- 
tened on the under side, and at her side stood a small 
basket of beans and a jar of water. At one end of the 
stone was laid a piece of dirty palm matting on which the 
dough fell. Near this a few live embers kept a little smoke 
rising over the stone. She put a handful of the small 
beans on the stone, and then, dipping her hand into the 
dish, let the water drop on the beans. Grasping the smaller 
stone with both hands she rubbed the mass, adding a little 



288 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



water occasionally, until it was converted into a coarse 
paste. Then she put on more beans and water and contin- 
ued the process until she had a sufficient quantity of dougfy 
for the meal. The smoke is intended to keep away the 
flies and other insects, but we noticed that a number of flies 
ventured too close and were mercilessly crushed by the re- 
lentless stone. 

A small coin as backsheesh gave us the privilege of 
trying our hand at the rubbing and grinding process. We 
found that it required much hard work and some skill to 
grind the beans in this way. It took but a small amount of 
exercise of this kind to gratify our curiosity, and we retired 
amidst the suppressed laughter of the men, women and 
children who had gathered about us and who doubtless pit- 
ied our ignorance, since we did not know enough to crush 
beans as the women of Ethiopia do. 

The people seem to be contented with their lot and are 
light-hearted and happy. At least it seemed so to us. We 
cannot refrain from quoting Mr. Hapley's description of 
the Nubians. He had landed from a Nile boat and was ly- 
ing beneath the shade of a grove of palm trees. He says: 
" A mother and two children— a chubby, unclad urchin of 
two or three, and an elder sister— entered from the outer 
glare and squatted down in the golden light filtering from 
above on the sandy area of the grove. They could not 
have traveled far, for they came in so gladsome and fresh. 
The daughter, a fine grown girl of eleven, ran off to the 
well and tripped back playfully, with one hand daintily 
steadying an earthen bowl, dripping over with grateful 
drink. Her mother awaited it, with her back against a 
palm tree. How these Nubian faces flash out at times an 
intelligence that no one would give them credit for! This 
woman, under thirty perhaps, yet already old and wrinkled, 



\ 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 289 

might have been handsome enough once, but her face was 
dull and stolid — of the earth earthy. Yet as she sat there, 
straining her little blackamoor to her breast, the soul came 
up in her face and she looked positively beautiful. It was 
like lighting the candle within the lantern. She wore a tu- 
nic of camel's-hair fabric, Nubian fashion, looped up on 
each shoulder, leaving the arms bare. It had more the cut 
of the Greek palla, than the skirt of the Egyptian fellah — 
a kind of extra fold falling from the neck to the waist. 
The daughter, a pretty little girl, lithesome and shapely, 
you might have taken her for a dryad of the woods. She 
romped free in the changing, leafy light of this copse as if 
her life were all play. There was something so gracious 
and winsome about her that you could not find heart to 
cavil. Yet her hair was reeking with castor oil, and I am 
afraid the gloss on her supple limbs was attributable to the 
same unguent. She seemed almost perfect in form; and 
the hair in question, which hung in a hundred little plaits 
about her shoulders, shortened in a line across her fore- 
head, framed a face of which the big black eyes, pouted lip 
and placid mien, seemed an echo of those sweet faces you 
see pictured in the old tombs— an echo from a far back 
world. Her sole dress, save a necklace or two of beads, 
was a short petticoat of tiny strips of leather, a kind of 
fringe decked out coquettishly with a multitude of cowry 
shells and glass beads, all of which tinkled merrily as she 
skipped along. You could not, for the life of you, call it 
an immodest costume, the thing was so natural and inno- 
cent. Indeed, until the girls marry, such is their only dress 
save a light veil thrown over the head against the sun." 

We saw many living pictures of this kind, save that 
many otherwise really handsome faces, among both men 
and women, were frightfully scarred. The Nubians seem 



2gO WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

to think that a scar adds to the beauty of the face. Two or 
three cuts are made on either cheek and they are kept open 
while healing so that great scars are the result. It is sin- 
gular what custom and fashion will do for a people. In this 
respect, many civilized nations are not far removed from 
these half-civilized tribes of Africa. In Germany a scarred 
face is regarded as a sign of bravery, and the students cut 
each other's faces in their so-called duels and the wound is 
so manipulated as to produce an ugly scar. In our own 
country fashion's demands are obeyed. Our women de- 
form themselves by tight lacing, wear huge deformities on 
their persons and no matter how peculiar or ridiculous a 
fashion may be it must be followed. We are glad to know 
that there are some among us who will not bow to the com- 
mands of the tyrant fashion, some who think for them- 
selves, and have independence of character enough to act 
for themselves. 

Crocodiles are still to be seen between the first and sec- 
ond cataracts; but since the introduction of steamboats be- 
tween Philae and Wady Haifa they are becoming quite rare 
indeed. We see several on our voyage up the river. Seen 
in the distance, they resemble a log of the palm tree more 
than anything else. As the steamer approaches them they 
slide down the muddy bank and disappear beneath the wa- 
ter. In ancient times these huge animals abounded in the 
waters of the Nile and such were their size and strength 
that many of the natives were destroyed by them. The an- 
cient Egyptians worshiped the crocodile, and these danger- 
ous and voracious monsters were carefully fed and tended 
in Lak Moeris, and held to be sacred by the people. When 
they died their bodies were carefully embalmed and laid 
away in costly tombs. 




292 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

On our journey southward from the first cataract we 
pass our first night at Kalabshi, where the boat is tied to 
stakes driven deep into the soft banks of the river. The 
town, a mere Nubian mud village, stands immediately on 
the Tropic of Cancer. Here, on the longest day of the 
year (June 21), at noon, an object casts no shadow, as the 
rays of the sun fall upon the earth in a straight line. At 
Kalabshi a temple was built, B. C. 1600, and the ruins of a 
later building on the old foundation are still to be seen. 
The natives have built their mud huts all around and about 
the ruins. The contrast between the ancient temple walls, 
the massive columns and the great doorways and the mud 
huts is at once striking and novel. The outer temple wall 
is two hundred and thirty-five feet long and one hundred 
and seventeen feet wide. The ruins are in a fair state of 
preservation, but the doorway is blocked with huge stones. 

In the interior of the temple are two inscriptions, one 
in Greek and the other in the Ethiopian demotic characters, 
which has not yet been deciphered. The following is the 
translation of the first: "I Silko, sub-king of the Nobades 
and all Ethiopians, came twice to Kalabshi and Tafeh. I 
fought against the Blemmyes and God gave me victory 
over them, three to one. Again I conquered and took pos- 
session of their cities, I fortified myself there with my 
troops, I overcame them and they sued to me. I made 
peace with them and they sware to me by the images of 
their gods, and I trusted their oath, for they were brave 
men. I ascended once more into the upper districts. 
Since I am sub-king, I go no longer after other kings but 
before them. And those who seek to strive with me, I do 
not allow to remain in their land unless they beg for par- 
don from me, for in the lower districts I am a lion, and in 
the upper districts a bear. I fought again with the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 293 

Blemmyes from Primis to Talmis. And I laid waste the 
other districts, the upper Nobad regions, when they sought' 
to strive with me. The rulers of the other peoples, who 
seek to strive with me, I do not allow to seat themselves in 
the shade, if they do not bow before; and they may not 
drink wine in their house. For whosoever raise themselves 
up against me, them I deprive of their wives and chil- 
dren."* 

We are followed to and from and about the temple 
by a number of men and boys. The women are at work 
in the fields and about their houses. Some of those who 
follow us offer to sell beads, doom palms, dates and other 
articles. Others bring baskets filled with eggs, offering 
them for sale to our cook and steward. A purchase is 
made at the rate of twenty-five cei\ts per hundred, about 
the same amount that we pay per dozen at home during the 
winter season. Notwithstanding their disposition to sell to 
us, they do not appear to be very friendly. One of the 
men has a heavy African war club, made of ebony. It is a 
fine specimen and attracts the attention of several of our 
party. Evidently the Nubian has no desire to part with his 
weapon of defense, for he asks a price for it that is more 
than five times its real value; and although he is offered a 
handsome price for it he persistently refuses to let it go. 

Nubia has an abundance of ruined temples, but we vis- 
it only a few of the most interesting. At Dekkeh we stop 
for a short time and walk a short distance across the desert 
to the ruins of a temple visible from the boat. Before go- 
ing ashore our Abyssinian guard equip themselves and 
march out before us. The natives seem friendly enough, 
but doubtless our guard has a restraining influence upon 
them. 



*" Upper Egypt," pages 308, 309. 



2 Q4 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The temple at Dekkeh was built by Erganum, an Ethi- 
opian monarch, who broke through the barbarous custom 
of his race and set at defiance the tyranny of the priests. 
Diodorus tells us that up to this time the priests had al- 
ways informed the king when the time had arrived for him 
to die, whereupon, in obedience to their commands, he slew 
himself. This strange custom seems to have grown out of 
a feeling like that which prevailed among our Norse ances- 
tors, that it was disgraceful for a warrior to die from dis- 
ease or old age, and the sagas record several instances of 
aged chiefs rushing into certain death to escape so dishon- 
orable an end. Wilkinson points out that a similar custom 
yet exists amongst certain races which lie farther to the 
south. Erganum, having received the intimation that the 
time had come for him to die, not only refused to obey the 
priests, but, collecting his troops, marched to the temple, 
slew them, and effected a reform of the entire system. He 
clearly distinguishes between submission to the priests and 
reverence for the gods, for he is represented on the walls of 
the temple as making the accustomed offerings to the dei- 
ties, and the usual cartouches declare that he was " protect- 
ed by Amnion," "the chosen of Ra," and "the beloved of 
Isis."* 

The people at the village of Dekkeh are among the 
first dwellers that we meet in the torrid zone. They are 
dark brown in color, several shades darker than the Egyp- 
tians and not so black as the negro. In appearance they 
are rather fine-looking, and among the young people one 
sees some faces that might be called handsome; but they 
age early and are then far from good-looking. The inevi- 
table scar on the cheeks, the wrinkles and the lack of intel- 
ligence in the eyes and face are not conducive to beauty. 

* " The Land of the Pharaohs," page 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 295 

The women are tall, straight and well formed, the result of 
the custom of carrying burdens on their heads from child- 
hood. They are not burdened with heavy clothing and 
have the free use of their limbs. Here, too, the nose is 
pierced and large metal rings depend from the side of that 
organ. When the ring is not in its place the hole is filled 
by pushing a white bead into it. The bead looks very 
white in its dark setting. The children are entirely nude 
and the care of their wardrobe is reduced to the minimum. 
They look like little bronze statues as they stand at a safe 
distance watching us. The girls of nine years and upwards 
wear an apron made of fringed leather and decorated with 
cowry shells and beads. It is curiously enough called 
" Madame Nubia," and is worn about the loins and consti- 
tutes their only garment. 

Of this garment Miss Edwards says: 44 Having seen a 
similar fringe in the collection of a friend at home, I at 
once recognized in 'Madame Nubia' one of those curious 
girdles which, with the addition of a necklace and a few 
bracelets, form the entire wardrobe of little girls south of 
the cataract. They vary in size according to the age of the 
wearer; the largest being about twelve inches in depth and 
twenty-five in length. A few are ornamented with beads 
and small shells; but these are the exception. The ordi- 
nary article is cheaply and unpretentiously trimmed with 
castor oil; that is to say, the girdle when new is well soaked 
in the oil, which softens and darkens the leather, besides 
adding a perfume dear to native nostrils. For to the Nu- 
bian, who grows his own plants and bruises his own berries, 
this odor is delicious. He reckons castor oil as among his 
greatest luxuries. He eats it as we eat butter. His wives 
saturate their plaited locks with it. His little girls perfume 
their fringes with it. His boys anoint their bodies with it. 



2Q6 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



His home, his breath, his food are redolent of it. It per- 
vades the very air in which he lives and has his being. 
Happy the traveler who, while his lines are cast in Nubia, 
can train his degenerate nose to delight in the aroma oi 
castor oil."* 




Nubian Mud Huts. 

In the village, made up of mud huts, we noticed wom- 
en pounding and rubbing lentils until a dough was formed 
which, when baked and dipped in castor oil, is esteemed a 
great luxury. The huts are as entirely devoid of anything 
to make them comfortable as it is possible to make them, 
and yet the people who live in them seem to be happy and 
contented. We wonder whether our boasted civilization, 
with the rum and whisky that follow it, would not make 
them, in the end, worse off than they now are. 

The people at Dekkeh are not given to selling relics. 
Some of the girls offer us agates which they have picked up 
on the desert, but they are shy and if spoken to or ap- 

*" A Thousand Miles up the Nile," page 176. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 297 

proached run away. One holds up in her hand a string of 
beads and when she receives a small coin in exchange for 
it runs away laughing, seeming to enjoy her success in 
making a sale. 

When we reached Dekkeh our pilot ran the boat 
ashore with considerable force, and when we were ready to 
leave the landing-place it was found that the Oonas was 
firmly grounded in the Nile mud. The engine was reversed, 
but the full power of our motive force failed to move the 
boat, even when seconded by the efforts of all hands 
aboard. There was shouting and pushing with poles and a 
rushing of the boat's wheel in the water, but all in vain. 
The boat did not move an inch. Then it was decided to 
call on the men of the village to help us. A runner was 
sent out and in about half an hour some twenty men ar- 
rived. The women and children came too and, squatted on 
the bank, silently watched the proceedings. The men wad- 
ed into the water and there was much shouting and push- 
ing, but the result was that the little steamer moved not. 
More men came; there was more pushing and shouting, the 
paddle wheel was reversed at full speed, but the united ef- 
forts failed to move the boat. Trial after trial was made, 
but with all the pushing and shouting the Oonas remained 
firmly fixed in her bed of mud. 

The situation now began to look serious. Several 
hours had passed away and the prospects for getting away 
from Dekkeh were not very bright. Then it was suggested 
that a windlass be rigged on the bow of the boat, and an 
anchor with a rope attached to it be thrown into the river 
at some distance from the shore. After some delay this 
was done and the end of the ro*pe was attached to the wind- 
lass on the steamer, and then, by turning the windlass, if the 
anchor held, the boat would be dragged off the bank of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 299 

mud. We watched the proceedings with a good deal of in- 
terest. Would the anchor hold? If not, the chances were 
good for us to remain at Dekkeh for some time. Finally 
the anchor held, the rope tightened, and slowly we began 
to move. The Nubians dashed into the water with a great 
shout, and putting hands and shoulders to the side of the 
boat pushed with all their strength, at the same time shout- 
ing at the top of their voices. In a few minutes more the 
Oonas swung out into the stream. A liberal backsheesh 
was distributed among the Nubians, we hoisted our anchor 
and steamed southward again. 

At Korosko we stopped again. Going ashore we 
passed through an Ethiopian village and climbed to the 
top of a mountain called Awas el-Guarani, from the top of 
which was had a fine view of the beautiful Nile valley on 
the one side and the desert on the other. 

Until the fall of Khartoum Korosko was the chief 
starting point for all the caravans going to Abou Hamed. 
The Nile makes a sweeping curve and by crossing the des- 
ert at this place the distance is not only shortened but the 
three upper cataracts, which are not navigable when the riv- 
er is low, are avoided. Here General Gordon left the river 
and crossed the desert on his last fatal journey to Khar- 
toum in 1884. Having reached his journey's end he held 
his own against the Mahdi for some time, but the place was 
finally taken and the brave man and his followers were put 
to death. No one escaped to tell the sad story. 




CHAPTER XVII. 



T Ztk^tolTZ Smaller Temple .—Pharaoh an d his Queen. 
— The Battle with the Hithtes. 

AMESES II, the Pharaoh of the oppression, was a 

great builder as well as a great statesman and gen- 

, eral He did not confine his building operations 

Knt Hotted Nubia with magnificent tern- 

" EgyP \rw Us of wn ch are recorded in extravagant 

f h deldl ; the greatest egotist the world has 

erms the ^ M used th { 

known. He not only ^ recorded hig 

»„ replaced by °< f "™*„„, L gre „ne„. 

i. f iUr of Ahou Simbel in Nubia. 
m ° S S^ P the N ile a distance of one hundred and six 

, f m Phite we see in the distance the dim outline 
ty miles from Phils, we see ^ ^ ^ 

lit and --tired to a depth of one hundred and rune- 



300 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

teen feet, forming the front of the temple, which is one 
hundred and five feet high. In cutting away the cliff, the 
face of the mountain was carved into four gigantic statues 
of the king. They are seated on thrones with their backs 
against the mountain. "These granite warders, hewn out 
of the living rock, keep watch at the portal of the temple, 
seated in solemn majesty as they have sat for nearly four 
thousand years." The guidebooks give the following di- 
mensions of the statues: "Their total height is sixty-six 
feet without the pedestal; the ear measures three feet and 
five inches; from the inner side of the elbow-joint to the 
end of the middle finger the distance is fifteen feet." 
These figures give but an inadequate idea of the magnitude 
of these wonderful statues bearing the features of the 
Pharaoh who oppressed God's people. 

The symmetry and beauty of the figures are as remark- 
able as their great size. The limbs and head are well pro- 
portioned. The coarseness and rudeness of finish usually 
associated with statues of great size are not to be seen in 
these mountain-like figures. Notwithstanding the enor- 
mous scale on which they are cut, the effect is quite natu- 
ral and successful. The features are delicately wrought, the 
expression of the face is kindly and pleasant. One writer 
says . -They are unique in art. The masterpieces of 
Greece, higher in rank, have nothing to rank with the mys- 
tic beauty of these." 

Miss Edwards, who spent several weeks at Abou Sim- 
bel, says: "The artists who wrought the original statues 
were embarrassed by no difficulties of focus, daunted by no 
difficulties of scale. Giants themselves, they summoned 
these giants out of the solid rock, and endowed them with 
superhuman strength and beauty. They sought no quar- 
ried blocks of syenite or granite for their work, They 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



303 



fashioned no models of clay. They took a mountain, and 
fell upon it like Titans, and hollowed and carved it as 
though it were a cherry stone, and left .it for the feebler 
men of after ages to marvel at forever. One great hall and 
fifteen spacious chambers they hewed out from the heart of 
it; then smoothed the rugged precipice towards the river, 
and cut four huge statues with their faces to the sunrise, 
two to the right and two to the left of the doorway, there 
to keep watch to the end of time. 

" Nothing in Egyptian sculpture is perhaps quite so 
wonderful as the way in which these Abou Simbel artists 
dealt with the thousands of tons of material to which they 
gave human form. Consummate masters of effect, they 
knew precisely what to do and what to leave undone. 
These were portrait statues: therefore they finished the 
heads up to the highest point consistent with their size. 
But the trunk and the lower limbs they regarded from a 
decorative rather than a statuesque point of view. As dec- 
oration, it was necessary that they should give size and dig- 
nity to the facade. Everything consequently was here 
subordinated to the general effect of breadth, of massive- 
ness, of repose. Considered thus, the Colossi are a tri- 
umph of treatment. Side by side they sit, placid and 
majestic, their feet a little apart, their hands resting on 
their knees. Shapely though they are, those huge legs 
look scarcely inferior in girth to the great columns at 
Karnac."* 

Each of the four statues bears the royal cartouch and 
name of Rameses II. It is deeply cut on the breasts, the 
arms and the legs of the four Colossi. By the side of the 
statues of the king is that of the queen. But it is so 
dwarfed by the gigantic proportions of the larger statues 

* " A Thousand Miles up the Nile," pages 288, 289, 



g04 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

that it at first escapes notice, and yet it is about twenty 
feet high. The representation shows what an exalted 
opinion Pharaoh had of himself and how he regarded his 
consort. 

Back of these four gigantic figures the mountain has 
been chiseled and hollowed out to a depth of one hundred 
and eighty-five feet. The entrance to the temple is be- 
tween the statues, two keeping eternal watch on either 
side. Entering the door we find ourselves in an immense 
hallway fifty-eight feet long and fifty-four wide. To sup- 
port the ceiling eight square columns of the original rock 
were left standing, and on the inner side and facing each 
other these columns were carved into images of the king. 
Each one of them is twenty feet high. They stand erect 
and form a central aisle in the hall. They are clothed in a 
close-fitting tunic with belts about the loins on which is 
cut the royal name of Rameses. 

The hall opens into eight chambers and into a smaller 
hall, at the end of which there is a small chamber with an 
altar, used as the place of sacrifice. The walls of this 
wonderful mountain temple are covered with paintings and 
sculpture in bas-relief. Of the decorations Manning says: 
"The walls are glowing with color like the pages of an il- 
luminated missal, magnified a thousandfold. Their theme 
is everywhere the same— the glory of Rameses. We can- 
not fail, however, to be struck by the contrast between the 
tranquil, gentle face of the deified monarch, and the deeds 
of savage ferocity which are here ascribed to him. Long 
lines of captives are led bound before him on their way 
to execution. He himself is depicted as slaying them with 
pitiless cruelty. In one sculpture he is grasping by the 
hair a group of prisoners, representing the various nations, 
African and Asiatic, which he has conquered, With his up- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



305 



lifted sword he is about to decapitate them. The god Am- 
nion hands him a scimiter, in token of his approval of the 
deed. We follow the mighty conqueror through his cam- 
paigns. In one place he is charging in his war chariot 
upon a whole phalanx of Scythians. In another, he single- 
handed slays their chief. In a third, he is laying waste the 




Rameses II Slaying his Captives {Abou Simbel). 



territory of the Ethiopians. But everywhere his counte- 
nance wears the same expression of tranquillity and repose 
which nothing can disturb."* 

On the north side of the great hall is to be seen a great 
picture, a monster battle scene, nearly fifty-eight feet long 
and twenty-five feet high, which is said to contain over 

* "The Land of the Pharaohs." 



3<d6 wanderings in bible lands. 

eleven thousand figures. It is much more than the scene 
of a battle, it is a grand pictorial history of a campaign. 
Everywhere Rameses II is to be seen triumphing over his 
foes. The inscriptions laud him as the mighty king, the 
great victor. He is drawing his chariot among his ene- 
mies, who flee before him. Some are crushed under its 
iron wheels while others fall beneath the stroke of his 
sword. A great river winds its way through the picture. 
Some of the fugitives plunge into the water and are 
drowned. The wounded and dead are strewn about the 
field of battle and riderless horses are to be seen running 
away from the carnage of the battle. The great picture is 
all for the glory of Rameses II. Some one has called him 
the Barnum of Egypt, and the name is appropriate. 

Further on is a group engaged in counting the hands 
that have been severed from the arms of those slain by the 
king. The royal secretary takes down the number while 
the others take up the hands one by one and throw them 
on a heap which has already assumed a great size. Again 
we see the king returning in great pomp from his victori- 
ous campaign, preceded by his prisoners. They are tied 
together in gangs, having ropes placed around their necks. 
Their arms are bound, some above the head, some behind 
and some in front of the prisoners. The annexed engrav- 
ing shows the prisoners to be of different nationalities. 
There is no mistaking the black skin, the flat noses and the 
thick lips of the upper group: they are as distinctively Afri- 
can as are the Abyssinians, Negroes and Nubians of to-day. 
And the lower group is as distinctively Asiatic. They stag- 
ger along with their heads thrown back, the very picture of 
pain and suffering. 

Among the faces on the wall are very many of the 
Jewish type, very distinctly and plainly marked. Indeed 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 307 

any one at all familiar with the peculiar faces of the sons 
of Jacob could at once point them out on the walls of this 
old rock-cut temple. There is not much doubt that Rame- 
ses II, the oppressor of the Jews, who compelled them to 
perform all kinds of hard labor, brought them up the Nile 




Group of Pharaoh 's Prisoners. 

to work in the quarries and assist in excavating the great 
mountain temple at Abou Simbel. If these silent, sculp- 
tured walls could speak, what a tale of human suffering and 
woe they could reveal! But they are as silent as the grave 
and will hold their secrets until the day of final reckoning. 

In one of the chambers we noticed an unfinished sculp- 
ture. It was intended to represent Rameses offering a sac- 



g08 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

rifice to his god Ammon Ra. The figure of the king was 
finished and a few lines were cut in that of the god, and 
there the work ceased. The drawing by which the artist's 
chisel was to be guided is plainly visible, and is perhaps as 
distinct to-day as it was thirty-three centuries ago when the 
lines were first drawn. Why was the work left thus unfin- 
ished? Who can tell? The silent halls of the old temple, 
the dwelling-place of bats and serpents, hold their secrets 
well. 

At this place we refer again to the very striking and 
close resemblance of the natives who inhabit Egypt and 
Nubia to-day to the race that built the pyramids, Memphis, 
Thebes, and who chiseled out the heart of this mountain 
and made of it a grand, enduring temple. Both in Egypt 
and here in Nubia we have seen faces strikingly like those 
sculptured on the walls of tombs and temples at Sakkara, 
Beni Hassan, Abydos, Dendereh, Esneh, Edfou, Thebes, 
and now here again in this mountain temple of the Pha- 
raoh of the oppression. As we wandered through its 
chambers a number of our attendant Nubians had the pe- 
culiar type of face seen on the sculptured walls. We no- 
ticed particularly the resemblance between one who stood 
by our side and the faces carved on the wall; it was so 
great that for a moment it seemed to us that one of the an- 
cient Egyptians had stepped from the tomb and taken flesh 
and blood upon himself again. No son ever looked more 
like his father. " Their skin is of a dusky yellow color, a 
shade darker than the Arab's, their countenance full without 
being puffed, their eyes large, black and slightly almond- 
shaped, the nose nearly straight and rounded at the tip, the 
nostrils dilated; the lips thick but not thrown back as those 
of the Negro: and beard and hair black, a little bushy but 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 3O9 

not woolly." They are a fine-looking and rather handsome 
race of people. 

In the evening of the day spent at Abou Simbel we 
climbed to the top of the mountain to see the sun set; and 
we had a fine view of the Nile valley and desert on either 
side. The ranges of the desert hills, bordered by the green 
banks of the river, studded with groves of palms, and tam- 
arisk trees and the villages of the natives are full of beau- 
ty and interest. The western sun throws over all these a 
glory of light and color beyond the description of pen or 
pencil. The atmosphere in this climate, where rain and 
dew are unknown, is wonderfully clear, and the sunsets are 
beautiful beyond description. As the monarch of the day 
sinks below the western horizon the sky is all ablaze with 
glory. 

" Now sinks more lovely ere his course is run, 
Behind the eternal hills the setting sun, 
Not as in Northern climes obscurely bright 
But one unclouded blaze of living light." 

South of the Tropic of Cancer the beautiful constella- 
tion known as the Southern Cross appears above the hori- 
zon. We saw the beautiful glittering stars, but they do not 
compare in magnitude with the constellations of our north- 
ern heavens. The Great Bear and Orion are much more 
brilliant, and if they could be seen in this clear atmosphere 
the Southern Cross would pale in comparison with them. 
But the Southern Cross is a beautiful constellation of stars, 
and we shall never forget how brightly it shone and how 
each star was mirrored in Egypt's dark river. 

We were up at two o'clock in the morning to see the 
stars, and then before sunup we went alone to the great 
temple. Just as the rim of the sun appeared above the 
eastern desert the interior of the temple was flooded with 



g I0 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

light. It is the one hour of all the twenty-four to see the 
temple. Its dark halls were lit up by a flood of light from 
the rising- sun. Even the gloom of the side chambers was 
broken by the reflected light. A short distance north of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 3H 

the great temple of Rameses II is a smaller rock-cut tem- 
ple. It would be a great work if it stood somewhere else, 
but here under the shadow of the Colossi it is dwarfed into 
insignificance. The face of the cliff has been smoothed for 
a distance of ninety feet, and six statues are carved in 
niches, three on either side of the entrance. The engrav- 
ing gives a good view of the front of the temple. Here 
again are statues of Rameses II, and also of his queen, 
Nefertari. Entering the doorway we found a hall forty 
feet in length by twenty-one in width, two chambers, an in- 
ner sanctuary and a transverse corridor. The ceiling, or 
rather the superincumbent mountain, is supported by six 
square pillars of the original stone. After visiting the 
great temple this smaller one loses much in importance. 

The statues on the outside, standing three to the right 
and three to the left of the door, are somewhat broken and 
mutilated. They are thirty feet high and represent Rame- 
ses II and his queen, Nefertari. Our engraving on the 
succeeding page shows the face of the one woman among 
all others upon whom the king set his love. Her statue is 
full of graceful beauty and the full lips, well-formed chin 
and nose and rounded cheek show that the queen was not 
without personal attractions. An inscription on the out- 
side sets forth that " Rameses, the strong in Truth, the be- 
loved of Ammon, made this divine abode for his royal wife 
Nefertari, whom he loves." Inside of the temple another 
inscription states that the queen, " the royal wife who loves 
him, constructed for him this abode in the mountain of pure 
waters." 

These inscriptions show that the Pharaoh of the op- 
pression had also a tender side to his nature and that even 
human love softens the hard, stony heart. One author,* 

* Miss Edwards. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 3I3 

writing of the smaller temple at Abou Simbel, says: " On 
every pillar, in every act of worship pictured on the walls, 
even in the sanctuary, we find the names of Rameses and 
Nefertari ' coupled and inseparable.' In this double dedi- 
cation, and in the unwonted tenderness of style, one seems 
to detect traces of some event, perhaps of some anniversa- 
ry, the particulars of which are lost forever. It may have 
been a meeting; it may have been a parting; it may have 
been a prayer answered, or a vow fulfilled. We see at all 
events that Rameses and Nefertari desired to leave behind 
them an imperishable record of the affection which united 
them on earth, and which they hoped would reunite them 
in Amenti. What more do we need to know? We see 
that the queen was fair; that the king was in his prime. 
We divine the rest; and the poetry of the place at least is 
ours. Even in these barren solitudes there is wafted to us 
a breath from the shores of old romance. We feel that 
love once passed this way, and that the ground is still hal- 
lowed where he trod." 

•» 

Quite different in character is the inscription in the 
great temple where the warlike nature of the king is set 
forth. This interesting inscription, found on a slab, states 
that in the fifth year of the reign of Rameses II his majesty 
was in the land of Tah, not far from Kadesh on the Oron- 
tes. The outposts kept a sharp lookout, and when the 
army came to the south of the town of Shabtun, two of the 
spies of the Shasu came into the court and pretended that 
they had been sent by the chiefs of their tribe to inform 
king Rameses II that they had forsaken the chief of the 
Cheta (supposed to be the Hittites of the Bible), and that 
they wished to make an alliance with his majesty and to 
become vassals of his. They then went on to say that the 
chief of the Cheta was in the land of Chirebu to the north 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

of Tunep, some distance off, and that they were afraid to 
come near the Egyptian king. These two men were giving 
false information, and they had actually been sent by the 
Cheta chief to find out where Rameses and his army were; 
the Cheta chief and his army were at that moment drawn 
up in battle array behind Kadesh. Shortly after these men 
were dismissed an Egyptian scout came into the king's 
presence, bringing with him two spies from the army of the 
chief of the Cheta; on being questioned they informed 
Rameses that the chief of the Cheta was encamped behind 
Kadesh, and that he had succeeded in gathering together a 
multitude of soldiers and chariots from the country round 
about. Rameses summoned his officers to his presence, 
and informed them of the news he had just heard; they lis- 
tened with surprise, and insisted that the newly-received in- 
formation was untrue. Rameses seriously blamed the 
chiefs of the intelligence department for their neglect of 
duty, and they admitted their fault. Orders were straight- 
way issued for the Egyptian army to march on Kadesh, 
and as they were crossing a river near that city the hostile 
forces fell in with each other. When Rameses saw this, he 
" growled at them like his father Menthu, Lord of Thebes, 
and having hastily put on his full armor, he mounted his 
chariot and drove into battle. His onset was so sudden 
and rapid that before he knew where he was he found him- 
self surrounded by the enemy, and completely isolated 
from his own troops. He called his father, or god, Ammon 
Ra to help him, and then addressed himself to the slaugh- 
ter of all who came in his way; and his prowess was so great 
that the enemy fell in heaps, one over the other, into the 
waters of the Orontes. He was quite alone, and not one ot 
his soldiers or horsemen came near him to help him. It 
was only with the greatest difficulty that he succeeded in 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 315 

cutting his way through the ranks of the enemy. At the 
end of the inscription he says: " Everything that my majes- 
ty has stated, that I did in the presence of my soldiers and 
horsemen."* 

The event here recorded was made the subject of a 
poem by Pentaur, the Egyptian poet, and was considered 
worthy to be inscribed on papyrus and upon the walls of 
the temples built by Rameses II. We quote several lines 
from the English translation of the poem. 

" Then the king he lashed each horse, 
And they quickened up their course, 

And he dashed into the middle of the hostile, Hittite host, 
All alone, none other with him, for he counted not the cost, 
Then he looked behind and found 
That the foe were all around, 

Two thousand and five hundred of their chariots of war, 

And the flower of the Hittites, and their helpers, in a ring, 

Cut off the way behind, 

Retreat he could not find; 

Then were three men on each car. 

And they gathered all together, and closed upon the king. 
Yea, and not one of my princes, of my chief men and my great, 
Was with me, nor a knight; 

For my warriors and my chariots had left me to my fate, 
Not one was there to take his part in the fight." | 

Our stay at Abou Simbel is none too long for us. It 
has that peculiar charm and interest that attaches to all 
places with which Bible characters have been associated 
These huge statues of the Pharaoh who knew not Joseph 
are one of the wonders of the world. Floating down the 
Nile after our visit to Wady Haifa we see these mighty 
warders, looking out from their mountain thrones, keeping 
silent watch over river and desert as they have kept watch 

* Budge, " The Nile," page 307, 308. 
t" Notes for the Nile," Rawnsly. 



316 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



for more than thirty-three centuries, and as they will con- 
tinue to keep watch until the last trump shall sound. A 
sudden turn in the river and they are lost to our sight for- 
ever. 




CHAPTER XVIII. 




From Abou Simbel to the Seco7id Cataract — A Figure of Christ.— 
W %dy Haifa — Warlike Appearances .— Women Veiling their Faces. 
— Contrast Between Virtue and Vice. — Beyond the Cataract — 
Horneward Bound— Egypt and the Prophets .— The Potter at his 
Wheel. — Cairo again. 



ROM Abou Simbel southward to Wady Haifa and 
the second cataract the Nile valley presents to the 
traveler an ever-changing aspect. The scenery be- 
comes more picturesque and rugged as we ascend the river, 
and the narrow strip of vegetation on either side becomes 
more tropical in its character. The doom palm which we 
saw first at Thebes now becomes more general, and fields of 
cotton and sugar cane line the narrow banks of the river. 
At many places the yellow sand of the desert comes down 
to the water's edge, whilst at others the mountains hem in 
the stream. 

"A desert lies on either hand, 
In stern and lone repose; 
Between the wastes of yellow sand 
The dark Nile flows. 

The dark-robed women file in troops, 

To fill their water-jars, 
Where wind-bound boats lie moored in groups 

With idle spars." 

Here and there, on some low mud island in the middle 
of the river, basking in the sunshine, may be seen the croc- 
odile, sacred to the ancient Egyptian god Sebek, who is 
317 



^ T g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

represented on the monuments with the head of this mon- 
ster. Disturbed in his slumbers he lazily raises his head 
and, seeing our swiftly-approaching boat, quickly disap- 
pears in the water. Boats with native crews are met and 
passed, and 

" Up from the river softly floats 
The boatmen's wailing song," 

as they laboriously pull against the swift current. The 
houses of the villages on the banks with dome-shaped roofs 
are all built of mud, and the natives are much darker 
skinned than those we meet farther north. The rays of the 
noonday sun, even in midwinter, beat down from a cloud- 
less sky so that we are glad to seek the shade. We realize 
now very fully that we are in the torrid zone of Africa. 

A few miles south of Abou Simbel, on the east bank of 
the river, is a small rock-cut temple belonging to the peri- 
od of Rameses II. It is without special interest, save that 
soon after the introduction of Christianity into Egypt by 
Saint Mark it was used as a place of worship. In one of 
the chambers may be seen a figure of Christ. In this in- 
stance one of the temples erected for the worship of idols 
was changed into a house of prayer for the worship of the 
living God. The temple is called Abahudah, after a Nubi- 
an village lying farther to the south. 

At two o'clock, Jan. 12, 1893, the Oonas was steered to 
a landing-place on the east bank of the Nile and made fast 
to stakes driven in the mud. We were at Wady Haifa and 
had reached the southern limit of our journey by boat. 

Wady Haifa is on the east bank of the Nile and con- 
sists of several small villages. It is the southern boundary 
of Egypt's possessions in Africa. Since the war in the Sou- 
dan and the death of Gordon there has been a military post 
at this place, garrisoned with five regiments of- native sol- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 319 

diers, mainly Negroes, under British officers. The Mahdi's 
soldiers are constantly threatening this frontier post and 
a sharp lookout is constantly kept for the enemy. Three 
gunboats, several batteries of artillery and the presence of 
a large body of soldiers give the place a warlike appear- 
ance. The troops are well drilled and are under excellent 
discipline, and it is said that they are brave men on the bat- 
tle field. 

On the side of the river opposite where our boat is tied 
we notice what is known as the Camel Corps. We are 
somewhat interested in watching the drilling and the ma- 
neuvers of this body of men mounted on the swift-footed 
dromedaries of the desert. An odd-looking troop of caval- 
ry it is. At a given word of command the camels suddenly 
halt in their swinging trot and kneel down; the men dis- 
mount and crouch by the side of the kneeling animal using 
it as a kind of breastwork while they aim and fire at an im- 
aginary foe. Then they mount again, dash out upon the 
desert at a swift pace, going through some very difficult ev- 
olutions, when the command to halt and dismount is again 
given. The drill is practiced every day, and it is wonder- 
ful how well the animals are trained. 

The Camel Corps is maintained for the purpose of pur- 
suing the Dervishes who, after making sudden attacks upon 
the garrison and doing what damage they can, escape again 
to the trackless desert. Horses were found to be practical- 
ly useless in pursuing these desert nomads, hence the or- 
ganization of the noted Camel Corps. The best trained 
camels will travel from sixty to seventy miles a day for 
three or four days without food or water. But the Dervish- 
es have the advantage. They are at home on the desert 
and can laugh their pursuers to scorn. 



320 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

A narrow gauge railway has been constructed from 
Wady Haifa to Sarras, a distance of thirty-five miles, for 
the purpose of carrying troops and military supplies above 
the second cataract, which is not navigable. More than 
half of it was torn up by the Mahdi's soldiers; the iron rails 
were thrown into the Nile and the cross-ties were used by 
them to boil their kettles. The entire line has again been 
rebuilt by the army of occupation at Wady Haifa and trains 
are run out under a strong military escort as far as Sarras. 

Two miles north of Wady Haifa and the garrison is a 
considerable Nubian village called Barbrosa, which we vis- 
it during the afternoon of our first day at the second cata- 
ract. Here we see some strange phases of human exist- 
ence. The soldiers of the garrison frequent the place and 
it has become a kind of trading post for them. The villa- 
gers are a mixture of Nubians, Abyssinians, Soudanese and 
Negroes from central Africa, each with his peculiar cus- 
toms and modes of living. The main street, of the village 
is lined with shops and the merchants are importunate in 
soliciting customers. We were offered swords, spears, 
knives, war clubs, shields and other implements of war. A 
spear from the Soudan changed ownership and is now in 
the author's library at Mount Morris. 

Not only at this Nubian village, but all along the 
Nile from Alexandria to the second cataract we have no- 
ticed the universal custom among virtuous women of veil- 
ing the face. Even the poor women who toil in the fields 
and those who come down to the river to fill their water- 
jars, though not veiled, would draw a part of their garment 
over their faces at the approach of any of the male mem- 
bers of our party. This modest reserve on the part of 
these women is all the more striking when contrasted with 
the appearance of those who do not have the reputation of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



being virtuous. To-day, coming into this Nubian village, 
we see on the streets a number of gaudily-dressed women 
bedecked with a great profusion of bright colors and cheap 
jewelry. Their faces are unveiled and their bold, brazen 
looks and disgusting actions tell only too plainly of the life 
of shame and degradation which they lead. The contrast 
between these and the modest, virtuous women with veiled 
faces is most striking. No greater insult could be offered 
to a virtuous woman in the East than to uncover her face 
in public, and the reason is obvious. It will be remembered 
that Paul, in writing to the Corinthians in reference to cov- 
ering or veiling the head in time of prayer, refers to this 
eastern custom: "But every woman that prayeth or prophe- 
sieth with her head uncovered dishonoreth her head." I 
Cor. 11:5. Some hold that the language was applicable 
only to the eastern people at that time; but this view seems 
scarcely tenable, for surely no virtuous woman would need 
to be told that it is a shame for her to have her head un- 
veiled. 

Early in the morning of our second day at Wady Haifa 
we took the train for an excursion above the second cata- 
ract. We went beyond the rock of Abu-Sir, which is usual- 
ly visited by all Nile travelers who come as far south as the 
second cataract. The commander of the post told us that 
it was unsafe to cross the river, as an attack of the Dervish- 
es might be expected. Of course we had no desire to meet 
these fanatical Moslems, and we were well satisfied with a 
ride on the railway around and above the cataract. The 
road skirts the desert for some distance and then approach- 
es the river again. Reaching the extreme southern limit of 
our Nile journey our train stopped, and we spent some time 
wandering about the desert and among the rocks along the 
river. 



» 



322 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Climbing to the top of a rocky knoll we have a mag- 
nificent view of the surrounding country. Owing to the 
singular clearness of the atmosphere distant objects appear 
very close to us. South of us the Libyan desert stretches 
out as far as the eye can reach in one vast undulating plain, 
its amber-colored sand glowing in the brilliant sunlight. 
Northwards is the rushing river, broken into numberless 
streams and lakes by the small islands and huge, black, pol- 
ished rocks, dashing and foaming down the rapids for a dis- 
tance of sixteen miles. The banks of the stream are lined 
with black rocks of volcanic formation, among which the 
wind has carried patches of the yellow sand of the desert. 
The scene is remarkable for its wildness and desolation, 
and beautiful withal on account of the clear light and tran- 
scendent coloring. 

This is the end of our southward journey. Wady 
Haifa is nine hundred and sixty-five miles south of the port 
of Alexandria. Add to this our trip by rail, and our jour- 
ney up the Nile covers very nearly one thousand miles. At 
this end of our journey we are not far from eight thousand 
miles from our western home in the New World. We gath- 
er a number of beautiful agate pebbles with which the des- 
ert is literally covered at this place. They have been finely 
polished by the sand which the wind has driven over them 
for ages. We notice a cemetery near Wady Haifa where 
the women are decorating the graves of their friends with 
these beautiful pebbles. Around the outer edge of the 
grave a row of the larger stones is placed, and then the lit- 
tle square inside is covered with the agates, presenting a 
very beautiful appearance. Just before we take the train 
for our return trip the Elder is the lucky finder of a horse- 
shoe which has been partly buried in the sand. We both 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 323 

recall the tradition of our boyhood days, and the horseshoe 
may now be seen in the Elder's cabinet at his home. 

At high noon the Oonas is loosed from the river bank. 
Swinging out upon the water her prow is turned north- 
wards and, with steam and current both in our favor, we 
glide rapidly down stream. We are glad to be safely away 
from Wady Haifa. There is far too much warlike spirit 
there for men of peace. Then another reason for rejoicing 
is that we are homeward bound, yes, thank God, homeward 
bound! What a world of meaning there is in these words 
to the weary wanderer far away from home and loved ones! 
They bring joy to the heart and stir the soul with renewed 
hope of meeting again those who are dearer to us than all 
the world besides, and never dearer than now when so far 
away. 

Only those who have felt in a far-away land the heart 
yearnings for home, who have known the weary, wakeful 
hours of the long night when sleep comes not to the eyes 
nor slumber to the eyelids, when the mind is filled with 
anxious thoughts of home and the loved ones there, only 
those can know to the full the meaning of the words home- 
ward bound. 

Then, too, God has been good to us and our hearts go 
out to him in gratitude for his protecting care over us dur- 
ing our long and dangerous journey. Hitherto the Lord 
has blessed us, and to-day as we turn our faces homeward 
we realize how good he has been to us, and we bless his 
holy name, praying that his blessings and his protecting 
care may be about us on our homeward journey and that 
we may again be permitted to meet those we love. 

Down the river we float, gliding by villages and palm 
groves, sakkiehs and shadufs, temples and tombs, the ruins 
of Egypt's departed greatness. At Philae we receive our 



324 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

mail and a bundle of letters and papers from home is hand- 
ed us. Good news from home cheers the heart and is like 
"cold water to a thirsty soul." A day is spent here in 
reading and answering letters and another at Assuan. The 
syenite quarries are revisited, a camel ride across a portion 
of the desert is endured, and we continue our journey 
down the Nile. 

On our way down the river we revisit the fallen tem- 
ples and shattered monuments, the broken columns and 
pilfered tombs of ancient Egypt. We pass by Thebes and 
Memphis, and draw a contrast between their bygone power 
and greatness and their present ruin and degradation. 
When these cities were in the height of their prosperity, 
when the temples swarmed with worshipers and the altars 
wanted not for sacrifices, when Egypt's name was feared in 
all the East, then the prophets of the Hebrews spoke of 
her downfall. 

Even before the long and flourishing reign of Amasis, 
Ezekiel spoke of the impending doom and ruin that should 
come upon the land of the Nile. " Behold, I am against 
. thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in 
the midst of his rivers, which hath said, My river is mine 
own, and I have made it for myself. And all the inhabit- 
ants' of Egypt shall know that I am the Lord, because they 
have been a staff of reed to the house of Israel." Ezek. 29: 
3, 6. " And the sword shall come upon Egypt, and great 
pain shall be in Ethiopia, when the slain shall fall in 
Egypt, and they shall take away her multitude, and her 
foundations shall be broken down. And they shall know 
that I am the Lord, when I have set a fire in Egypt, and 
whe?i all her helpers shall be destroyed. Thus saith the 
Lord God; I will also destroy the idols, and I will cause 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



325 



their images to cease out of Noph;* and there shall be no 
more a prince of the land of Egypt: and I will put a fear in 
the land of Egypt. And I will make Pathros desolate, and 
will set fire in Zoan, and will execute judgments in No.f 
And I will pour my fury upon «Sin, the strength of Egypt; 
and I will cut off the multitude of No. And I will set fire 
in Egypt: Sin shall have great pain, and No shall be rent 
asunder, and Noph shall have distresses daily. The young 
men of Aven and Pi-beseth shall fall by the sword: and 
these cities shall go into captivity. At Tahpanhes also 
the day shall be darkened, when I shall break there the 
yokes of Egypt: and the pomp of her strength shall cease 
in her: as for her, a cloud shall cover her, and her daugh- 
ters shall go into captivity." Ezek. 30: 4, 8, 13-18. 

The words of the prophecy of this book have been ful- 
filled to the letter. The ruins of Thebes, surrounded by the 
poor mud huts and the mean villages of the natives, with 
her prostrate columns, broken shafts, and sand-covered 
temples, speak in unmistakable language, saying: "Behold 
the fulfillment of the word of the Lord spoken by the 
mouth of his servant the prophet." The annexed engrav- 
ing, a view in one of the villages of ancient Thebes, speaks 
of the desolation of that ancient capital of the Pharaohs 
and of the fulfillment of prophecy. 

Not only at Thebes do we hear the voice proclaiming 
the truth of God's Book, but Memphis with her lonely 
statue of the Pharaoh of the oppression, OnJ with her sin- 
gle obelisk, Goshen with her fertile fields, the treasure cities 
of Pharaoh, — Pithom and Raamses, — the desert and the Red 
Sea all bear testimony, saying, "The Book of God is true." 



♦Memphis. 

fThebes. 

JHeliopolis. 



^26 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Even while we are in Egypt we see the evidence of the 
truth of the saying, "There shall be no prince in Egypt." 
The present ruler is a vassal of the Sultan of Turkey, but is 
under the hand of England. Only a few weeks ago the 
Khedive, as the ruler is called, becoming dissatisfied with 




his cabinet, dismissed the officers and appointed new ones. 
England at once protested. The Khedive was compelled 
to dismiss the ministry he had selected and appoint such 
officers as England dictated. The movement on the part 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 327 

of the ruler seemed to indicate too much independence 
and England sent a number of troops to reinforce her army 
of occupation on the banks of the Nile. Surely there is no 
prince in all the land of Egypt to-day. 

On our way down the river we stopped at Keneh, 
where are located a number of potteries. There many of 
the water bottles and jars used in Egypt are made. We 
were much interested in a visit to the potters at work at 
their wheels. In the Bible there are many allusions to the 
potter and his work, and it is singular to find the descrip- 
tion given in the Book fully confirmed by the actual prac- 
tice there to-day. And this is not only true of the potters 
in Egypt, but also of those in Palestine. There was the pot- 
ter sitting by his wheel, turning it with his foot, a descrip- 
tion of which we may find in the Apocrypha: " So doth the 
potter, sitting at his work and turning the wheel about with 
his feet: he fashioneth the clay with his arm." So the pot- 
ters there turned the wheel with their feet as was done in 
Bible times, as their fathers did four thousand years ago. 

By his side the potter had a heap of prepared clay and 
a jar of water. Taking a lump or ball of clay into his hand 
he placed it firmly on the wheel, then, dipping his hands in- 
to the water and turning the wheel horizontally with his 
foot, gave the mass of soft clay the shape of a cone. In- 
to the top of this he inserted his thumb, and thus opened a 
hole down into the center of the clay. This he enlarged by 
pressing his hand into it and shaping it with both hands un- 
til he had an open vessel before him, which we thought 
would in the end be a jar; but while we looked on it sud- 
denly assumed the shape of an Egyptian water bottle. 
Thus the potter gave the -vessel whatever shape it pleased 
him. It was from a scene like this that Jeremiah drew the 
lesson of God's absolute power over men and nations. 



j 2 g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The whole reference to the potter is so much like what we 
see to-day that we give it in full: "The word which came 
to Teremiah from the Lord, saying, Arise, and go down to 
the potter's house, and there I will cause thee to hear my 
words Then I went down to the potter's house, and, be- 
hold he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel 
that 'he made of clay was marred in the hand of the pot- 
ter- so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to 
the' potter to make it. Then the word of the Lord came 
to me, saying, O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as 
this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the 
potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, house of Israel. 

Je '' How natural it all seems now as we stand here watch- 
ing the potter shaping the vessels and making of the cay 
such forms as he will. Even while we watch him one form 
is marred in his hand and the clay is massed into a ball 
again, another cone is formed, "and he made it again an- 
other vessel." How absolute is the power of the potter 
over the clay, and how pliant is the clay in his hand; bu 
not more so than we should be in the hands of God. Paul 
refers to this when he says, " Nay but, O man, who art thou 
thatrephest against God? Shall the thing formed # ay 
him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus Hath 
not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to 
make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishon- 
our?" Rom. 9 : 20, 21. To those who are unwilling to 
m ake a complete surrender of self to God this Scripture 
may seem hard to understand. It means nothing more or 
less than self-abnegation and a willing and cheerful obedi- 
ence to the letter and spirit of the Gospel. 

The pottery is made thin, is very fragile and is easily 
broken. Much of it is baked in the sun, and this also ac- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 32Q 

counts for the ease with which it is broken. It is very 
cheap. We found upon inquiring that a water bottle hold- 
ing half a gallon was sold at retail for half a piaster, a little 
over two cents. The cheapness and fragility of the pot- 
ter's ware are often referred to in the Bible. According to 
the law, every earthen vessel into which any unclean thing 
had fallen was at once to be broken in pieces.* The pot- 
tery was so cheap that it was better to break an unclean 
vessel than to attempt to purify it. 

The prophet Isaiah speaks in this manner of the pot- 
ter's vessel: " And he shall break it as the breaking of the 
potter's vessel that is broken in pieces; he shall not spare: 
so that there shall not be found in the bursting of it a sherd 
to take fire from the hearth, or to take water withal out of 
the pit." Isa. 30: 14. On this passage Dr. Thomson re- 
lates what he saw in Joppa, and in other parts of the Bible 
Lands. Referring to the "sherd to take fire from the hearth, 
or to take water withal out of the pit," he says: "It is very 
common to find at the spring or the pit pieces of broken 
jars, to use as ladles, either to drink from or to fill with; and 
bits of fractured jars are preserved for this purpose. If 
you take your stand near any of the public ovens here in 
Joppa in the evening, you will see the children of the poor 
coming with sherds of pottery in their hands, into which 
the baker pours a small quantity of hot embers and a few 
coals with which to warm up their evening meal. Isaiah's 
vessels, however, were to be broken into such small bits 
that there would not be a sherd of sufficient size to carry 
away a few embers from the hearth, nor to take water out 
of the pit. These comparisons are exceedingly expressive 
where the actions referred to are of constant occurrence, 
as they are throughout this country at the present day."f 

*Lev. 11: 33. f " The Land and the Book," page 37. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

We left the potter at his wheel after giving him the 
customary backsheesh; for a gift is demanded if you but 
stop and look at a man at work. He seems to feel that he 
has conferred a favor upon you and that you should pay 
him for it. Carrying with us the lesson drawn from him by 
the inspired writers of the Bible, we had a desire to carry 
some of his wares with us also, but owing to their fragile 
nature we thought it best not to try to do so. 

And now our Nile journey ends where it began a 
month ago, at the City of Cairo. It has been a month of 
hard work, of much sight-seeing, but withal of intense in- 
terest to the writer. During the month we traveled by 
steamboat, on donkeys and camels, and on foot a distance 
of some two thousand miles. We know that our readers 
cannot take the interest in reading these sketches that 
comes to us on the journey, but we write with the hope that 
they will prove, to some degree, interesting and instructive. 
' Our aim is not to amuse, but to give facts and draw lessons 
that may be helpful to Christians. The Lord prospered 
our journey. The Elder was indisposed a few days, the re- 
sult of fatiguing work; saving this, we enjoyed excellent 
health on the entire journey. For these privileges which 
we have enjoyed and for the blessings vouchsafed to us we 
thank the Giver of all good. 



CHAPTER XIX. 



The Coptic Church.-The Banished Patriarch.— An Interview with 
his Representative. -The Doctrines of the Coptic Faith —Trine 
Immersion and Feet-washing.-Innovations.-A Church Difficulty 
-Helwpohs.—An Ancient Sycamore Tree .-The Lone Obelisk — 
The Fulfillment of Prophecy.— Lack of Bible Knowledge 




jAIRO has lost none of its interest during our ab- 
sence, and our second visit is even more enjoyable 
and pleasant than the first. We are now some- 
what acquainted with the place and the peculiar loneliness 
which comes to the traveler when he finds himself in a 
large city with which he is wholly unacquainted, not even 
understanding the language spoken, has gone, and we feel 
that we know our ground. Our stay in the city was none 
too long to become at all familiar with life in the capital 
of modern Egypt. 

The Copts are an interesting portion of the population 
of Cairo. When Christianity was introduced into Egypt it 
found a ready and joyful acceptance among the descend- 
ants of the ancient Egyptians. Regarding life as a pil- 
grimage to the grave, and as a time for preparation for an- 
other world, and having a faint belief in immortality and 
the resurrection, it was an easy matter for them to grasp 
these principles of Christianity. Then, too, their ancient 
religion had degenerated into the lowest form of idolatry. 
With hundreds of gods to be worshiped, and a host of self- 
seeking priests who designedly kept the truth from the 
people in order that they might be supported, it is not 



gg2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

strange that they readily accepted the simple doctrines of 
the Gospel. The new faith was simple and adapted to the 
wants of the rich and poor alike, bringing them freedom 
from priestcraft and the blessing of salvation. The early 
Christians were not disturbed by speculative theology and 
dogmatic discussions. They were satisfied with the plain 
words of the Gospel and cheerfully and willingly obeyed 
its commands. But as time passed on the church grew in 
numbers and in worldly wisdom. Questions as to the na- 
ture of Christ, the time for observing the Lord's Supper, 
the presence of the body of Christ in the bread of the Com- 
munion, and other questions of like character disturbed the 
peace of the church. One of these questions,— that of the 
nature of Christ— was destined to make a division in the 
church. It was discussed for a long time and finally, in 
451, the Great Council of Chalcedon affirmed the doctrine 
that Christ was both human and divine. The Egyptians, 
with characteristic tenacity, clung to the teaching of Euty- 
chus, who taught them to revere only the divine nature of 
the Savior. The contention grew warm and resulted in 
the excommunication of the Egyptian church as heretical, 
and here we have the beginning of what is known as the 
Coptic church. 

After the excommunication they suffered much from 
persecution, and during the sixth century thousands of 
them lost their lives in defense of their doctrines. The 
name is simply an Arabic corruption of the Greek name of 
Egyptians, and among the Copts are to be found the direct 
descendants of the Pharaohs. They have also preserved, 
in their rituals and in their printed Scripture, the language 
of old Egypt. The representative of the patriarch of the 
Copt church at Cairo told us that at the present time they 
number seven hundred thousand; but as the census is not 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 333 

accurately taken there is some doubt as to the reliability of 
this statement. 

On our journey up the Nile we attended services in a 
Coptic church at Luxor on Christmas Eve and were much 
interested in what we saw and heard. And now, by special 
appointment, we have an interview with the representative 
of the patriarch, who is at this time living in banishment in 
one of the convents in the desert, leaving the management 
of his affairs at Cairo in the hands of an archbishop. 

We take with us, as interpreter, Selim Aklam, a native 
of Damascus. He is a graduate of the American mission 
school at Beyrut and we find him obliging and capable. 
He is well informed as to the history of the Coptic church 
and gives us much valuable information. We call on the 
archbishop who is acting instead of the banished patriarch. 
He is also president of the Coptic College at Cairo. We 
are very cordially and kindly welcomed. Sweetmeats and 
coffee are served and we are made to feel very much at 
home. We find the archbishop to be a very pleasant and 
well-informed man. He wears a full beard, as all Orientals 
do, and his kindly face is pleasant to look upon. He has 
passed the fiftieth year of his life, all the mature years of 
which he has given to the service of the Coptic church. 
We spent some time with him, asking questions and re- 
ceiving answers through our interpreter, Selim. The result 
of our interview, of which we took copious notes, is briefly 
given as follows: 

The patriarch of the Coptic church, who has spiritual 
jurisdiction over the entire fraternity, is elected from 
among their own number by the monks of the five monas- 
teries belonging to the church. He must be unmarried, 
and is usually eminent among his own class for piety and 
wisdom. He is regarded as the spiritual head of the visi- 



334 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

ble church and respect and veneration are usually shown 
him by all the Copts. The bishops and ministers must be 
married men, and no one who is unmarried can be ordained 
to either of these offices. If the wife of a bishop or minis- 
ter dies, the survivor is not allowed to remarry. They thus 
hold literally to the words of the apostle in his qualifica- 
tions of a bishop when he says he must be the husband of 
one wife. 

They believe and teach that the Savior was wholly di- 
vine in his nature, holding that the divinity of the Son of 
God entirely absorbed every element of human nature, and 
that he was begotten of God, hence very God. It was this 
particular article of faith which resulted in the expulsion of 
the Egyptian church as heretics by the Great Council of 
Chalcedon, A. D. 451, and the Coptic church holds with 
wonderful tenacity to this doctrine even to the present 
time. 

They look upon all who have not been dipped in the 
water into each of the three names of the Holy Trinity as 
unbaptized heretics. For their authority for the three dip- 
pings they refer to the commission given by Christ to his 
disciples. They also claim to have kept this form of bap- 
tism from the beginning as it was delivered to them by the 
apostolic church, and say they propose to cling to it unto 
the end. In practice, the candidate is taken down into the 
water and dipped three times face forward. 

Twice each year, on Thursday before Easter Sunday 
and on Christmas evening, which according to their calen- 
dar (the old style) occurs Jan. 6, they engage in the relig- 
ious rite of feet-washing. In this they claim to follow the 
example and command of Christ as given in John 13 
They regard it as a doctrine of their church. In the ob- 
servance of this rite the bishops, ministers and deacons do 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 335 

the washing, and every member of the Coptic church may 
have his feet washed. During the observance of the rite 
they salute each other with the right hand of fellowship 
and the kiss of peace. 




A Coptic Woman. 



The Communion is administered much in the same way 
as in the Roman church. Mass is said, and there is much 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

formality connected with this part of the religious service. 
They keep the agape or feast of love as a social meal. It 
is observed in the monasteries where the food is brought by 
those who come together. 

These are some of the more important doctrines held 
by the Coptic church. Living in Egypt where, until with- 
in a few years, they have been entirely deprived of educa- 
tional advantages, they are, as might be expected, densely 
ignorant. They have kept some of the doctrines of the 
Gospel intact, but there are. to be found in their practice 
many innovations that are not Scriptural. At one time 
they practiced circumcision, but in later years this has been 

entirely given up. 

They also baptize infants. Living, as they do, in con- 
tact with Islamism they have to some extent been influ- 
enced by its teaching. This is noticeable at some places 
where the practice of polygamy is permitted among the 
laymembers. 

They are the descendants of the ancient Egyptians and 
we were often struck by the peculiar type of face. They 
bear a striking resemblance to the faces painted on the 
walls of the ancient temples. In some instances the faces 
are strikingly beautiful. 

A conflict is now going on in the church. The patri- 
arch has gradually grown in power until he has assumed 
the functions of a pope. He opposes education and ad- 
vancement. A reform party started some years ago. 
They advocate education and a council by which the church 
is to be controlled in the future. Many of the ministers 
among the Copts are unable to read or write. They learn 
the liturgies by rote and are then qualified to serve the 
church. The reformers want to educate the ministry. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 337 

They want them all to be able to read and write and to 
have Bible training. 

A college has been started at Cairo for this purpose. 
All of these things the patriarch opposes. He insists that 
his power must not be disturbed and that education is an 
innovation which must not be admitted into the church, 
The conflict grew warm, and finally the patriarch excom- 
municated the bishops who were moving in the reform. 
They held a council and called upon the Khedive to help 
them. He did so by banishing the patriarch to one of the 
monasteries in the desert. Thereupon the council appoint- 
ed a man in his place. The patriarch from his place of re- 
tirement issued an order excommunicating the acting 
patriarch and all who upheld him. So the conflict waged, 
destroying the peace of the Coptic community. This ac- 
counts for our interview with the representative instead of 
the patriarch himself. These stirring events occurred in the 
Coptic church while we were in Egypt. The sequel to the 
whole matter was that the patriarch agreed to the condi- 
tions of the reformers and was recalled from banishment. 
The Cairo papers which we saw at Jerusalem gave a long 
account of the reception of the patriarch on his return from 
banishment. There was great rejoicing among the Copts 
because the trouble had been settled and their patriarch 
was with them again. 

The conflict and consequent difficulty in the Coptic 
church seems to be only what befalls all religious organiza- 
tions when human agencies become dominant. The divine 
and not the human should rule in the church, and when 
this is the case peace and harmony prevail and the churcji 
prospers. 



338 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



HELIOPOLIS. 

Whilst Cairo itself contains none of the ruins of an- 
cient Egypt, yet it stands, as we have seen, within a short 
distance of Memphis, Sakkara, the pyramids great and 
small, the Sphinx and, last but by no means least in gener- 
al interest, Heliopolis, the On of the Bible. The Egyp- 
tians called the place " The dwelling or seat of Ra 
(Helios), and the Hebrews gave it the name of On, "And 
Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-paaneah; * and he 
gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Poti-pherah 
priest of On." Gen. 41: 45. 

At On was the magnificent temple of the sun, and 
there was also located the most noted school and universi- 
ty of ancient Egypt. It was at On, as Mariette tells us, 
that Moses was instructed in all " the learning of Egypt." 
To this great center of learning and culture came men from 
ill parts of the East to learn the mystic lore of the priests, 
and the arts of the magicians and sorcerers of the school of 
Jannes and Jambres who withstood Moses and Aaron before 
Pharaoh. But the magnificent temple which stood here 
was the wealthiest and most noted in all the land of the 
Pharaohs. "The immense wealth of this noted shrine is 
mentioned in the Harris papyrus in London, which gives a 
list of the gifts presented to it by Rameses III alone. The 
staff of priests, officials, custodians, and menials connected 
with the temple is said to have numbered no less than 
twelve thousand, nine hundred and thirteen. As each Pha- 
raoh was regarded as the human embodiment of Ra, it was 
natural that he should present special offerings to the chief 
scene of the worship of that god, and should proudly add 
to his titles that of ' Lord of Heliopolis.' The most cele- 

* In'the Coptic this name signifies, a revealer of secrets, or the man to whom secrets 
are revealed. 




The Obelisk at On. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



34i 



brated of the ancient schools, with the teachers of which 
Herodotus once conversed, was also established at Heliop- 
olis, while in Strabo's time, born B. C. 60, the famous seat 
of learning had ceased to exist, although the houses of the 
priestly scholars were still standing. The guides showed 
the great geographer the dwelling in which Plato and Eu- 
doxus were said to have resided for thirteen years; 'for/ he 
says, speaking of the professors at this university, ' these 
persons, so admirably imbued with knowledge of heavenly 
things, could only be persuaded by patience and politeness 
to communicate some of their doctrines; but most of them 
were concealed by these barbarians.' Obelisks, the em- 
blems of the sun's rays, were of course frequently dedicat- 
ed to the god of the sun and his temple; and we are ac- 
cordingly informed that Heliopolis was full of obelisks."* 

Of the many obelisks which once stood at Heliopolis 
there is but one left, the solitary survivor of the departed 
greatness of the City of the Sun. The annexed photo- 
graph, so beautifully reproduced on page 339 gives us an 
exact picture of the lonely obelisk. 

A visit to Heliopolis, which is five and a half miles 
from Cairo, leads us through a richly-cultivated district. 
The soil is remarkable for its fertility. The road is lined 
on either side with acacia and tamarisk trees which afford 
a delightful shade and shield us from the rays of the sun. 
As the road leads to one of the Khedive's palaces it is well 
kept up and affords a most delightful drive. On either 
side are fine groves of orange, lemon and pomegranate 
trees. At the Khedive's garden we stop and for a small 
sum of money purchase from an attendant a lot of the lus- 
cious fruit. The flavor is exceedingly fine and the oranges 
equal the famous fruit of Joppa and Florida. 

*Baedeker, "Lower Egypt," page 334. 



g42 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

We now come in sight of the sandy desert which 
bounds Egypt on every side. Before entering upon the 
desert, however, we come to a small garden, in the midst of 
which stands a very eld sycamore tree. It is knotted and 
gnarled and props are placed under its aged limbs to keep 
them from breaking away from the trunk of the old tree. 
According to an old tradition it was beneath the shade of 
this tree that Joseph and Mary with the infant Savior rest- 
ed in their flight to Egypt. The tree itself, although of 
great age, is not as old as the tradition affirms. Some de- 
gree of probability is given to the legend from the fact 
that at the beginning of the Christian era there was a 
large Jewish settlement at this place, and it is altogether 
probable that Joseph would have taken his young wife and 
her babe to his own people. 

Only a short distance from the garden stands the obe- 
lisk of On. With the remains of a wall now nearly covered 
it is all that remains of the magnificent temple, the great 
colleges, the many obelisks of the great City of Heliopolis. 
The obelisk is the oldest yet discovered in Egypt. It is a 
single shaft of red granite cut from the quarries at Syene 
(Assuan) and is sixty-six feet high. It was floated down 
the Nile and set up at Heliopolis nearly four thousand 
years ago, and here it has stood a silent witness to all the 
events of the last forty centuries. It stood here when 
Abraham brought his beautiful wife Sarah down into Egypt 
to escape the famine in the Land of Canaan; it stood here 
when the lad Joseph was sold as a slave to Potiphar, and 
afterwards was a witness of his wonderful success as a ruler 
of Egypt; it stood here when Moses was a student in the 
great university of On, and he doubtless walked by its base 
many times when he was a schoolboy learning the wisdom 
of the Egyptians; it stood here when Christ was born, and 




To face page 342. 

and Garden near Cairo. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 343 

looked down upon the father and mother with their babe 
when they fled into Egypt to escape the savage cruelty of 
Herod; and it stands here to-day a monument of the great- 
ness of a departed race, and in a remarkable manner bears 
witness that the Book of God is true; for the prophet of 
God said, " He shall break also the images of Beth- 
shemesh * that is in the land of Egypt; and the houses of 
the gods of the Egyptians shall he burn with fire." Jer. 
43: 13. The glory of Heliopolis has long since departed, 
the images are broken in Beth-shemesh and the houses of 
her gods are burned with fire. The obelisk saw the fulfill- 
ment of this prophecy, and is all that is left of the an- 
cient City of the Sun. 

Dr. Schaff relates the following amusing incident 
which came under his observation at Heliopolis. It illus- 
trates how little some travelers know about the Bible. He 
says: <4 A rich California gold miner, who had some con- 
fused recollections of his Sunday-school lessons in early 
youth, and was traveling in Egypt with some friends, when 
informed that Joseph got his wife at this place and that she 
was the daughter of a priest, was quite astonished, and in- 
dignantly asked, 'Was Mary Magdalene that married 
Joseph, the daughter of a priest?' The same gentleman, 
when crossing the delta, remarked, ' We shall soon pass the 
Jordan! 'No,' said his friend, 'the Jordan is a river in Pal- 
estine.' 1 You are right,' he replied, 4 it was the Danube I 
meant.' I met this traveler in the Mediterranean Hotel in 
Jerusalem, when he gave the company at the dinner table 
the important piece of information that he had just visited 
Aceldama, 'the famous place which Judas sold for thirty 
pieces of silver.' I felt quite ashamed of America, but was 

* Heliopolis is here translated Beth-shemesh, which means literally the house of the 
sun. On is derived from the " Abode of the Sun." Both words refer to the same place. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

somewhat relieved afterward when I asked an English trav- 
eler whether he had passed through the desert and visited 
Mount Sinai, and was told that he really did not remember, 
and ' must first look up his journal.' " 

Very much like these men are those persons who criti- 
cise the Bible and have never carefully examined the Book 
and the abundant evidences of its credibility. It would 
seem to be the height of folly for any one to condemn a 
work without having first examined it and carefully 
weighed all the testimony of its truthfulness; but we meet 
men almost entirely ignorant of the Bible who say they do 
not believe it. They have acquired a number of the stock 
phrases of infidel writers and their objections to the Bible, 
which have been met and answered many times, and with 
these they assail a work which they have never examined. 
This is true of hundreds of men, young and old, who are 
found in the ranks of infidelity to-day. All that is needed 
to prove this statement is to quote the Bible to them and 
ask them some questions as to its contents, and their igno- 
rance of the Book they condemn will soon be apparent. 



CHAPTER XX. 



/S, 

The Mohammedan Religion. — The Kora7i and the Bible Compared. — 
The Doctrines of Islamism. — The Belief in Paradise a7id in Hell. 

— Hours of Prayer. — The Dervishes. — Degradatioii of Women. — 
The Mohammedan University at Cairo. — Self-denial of Teachers 

and Students. — The Koran the Text-book. — Intellectual Condition 

of the Moslems. 

AIRO is the center of the Moslem religion in Egypt, 
and while traveling in the East we had an opportu- 
g^XJq nity of seeing something of the general character of 
Mohammedanism. We give our readers the views 
of Dr. Schaff on the subject. The Doctor made a careful 
study of the subject and we quote him, with some changes: 
The Mohammedan religion is composed of Jewish 
monotheism, heathen sensuality and spurious Christianity, 
pervaded by devotion to Mohammed, the poet and false 
prophet of Arabia. It may be called a bastard Judaism, as 
the Arabs are Ishmaelites, or children of the bastard son of 
Abraham. 

The Koran is the bible of the Moslems, who believe it 
to be literally and verbally inspired, infallible, and a uni- 
versal guide in religion, morals, grammar, philosophy, and 
government. They hold that the words of the Koran are 
inspired, hence it is too sacred to be translated or printed; 
but it has often been translated by Christian scholars from 
the Arabic into modern languages. 

The Koran is unquestionably one of the great books of 

the world, as men count greatness. It has left its impress 

345 , 



346 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

upon ages. It feeds the devotion and regulates the lives of 
more than a hundred million human beings. It has many 
passages of poetic beauty, religious fervor, and wise coun- 
sel, but mixed with absurdities, bombast, unmeaning ima- 
ges, and low sensuality. It abounds in repetitions and 
contradictions which are not removed by the convenient 
theory of abrogation. It alternately attracts and repels 
and is a most wearisome book to read. Gibbon says, "The 
Koran is a glorious testimony to the unity of God," but 
calls it also, very properly, "an endless incoherent rhap- 
sody of fable and precept and declamations which seldom 
excites a sentiment or idea, which sometimes crawls in the 
dust, and is sometimes lost in the clouds." Reiske de- 
nounces it as the most absurd book, and a scourge to a 
reader of sound common sense. Goethe characterizes the 
style as severe, great, terrible, and at times truly sublime. 
But this is too much praise. 

Of all books, not excluding the Vedas, the Koran is 
the most powerful rival of the Bible, but falls infinitely be- 
low it in contents and form. Both are thoroughly oriental 
in style and imagery, and were born under similar condi- 
tions of soil, climate, and habits of life. Both contain the 
moral and religious code of the nations which own them; 
the Koran, like the Old Testament, is also a civil code, for 
in Mohammedan countries the civil and ecclesiastical gov- 
ernments are one. Both have the freshness of occasional 
composition growing out of a definite historical situation 
and specific wants. But the Bible is the genuine revelation 
in Christ of the only true God; the Koran is a mock revela- 
tion, without* Christ and without atonement. The Bible is 
historical, and embodies the noblest aspirations of the hu- 
man race in all ages to the final consummation; the Koran 
'begins and stops with Mohammed. The Bible combines 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 347 

endless variety with unity, universal applicability with local 
adaptation; the Koran is uniform and monotonous, confined 
to one country, one state of society, and one class of minds. 
The Bible is the book of the world, and is constantly trav- 
eling to the ends of the earth, carrying spiritual food to all 
classes of the people; the Koran stays at home, and is in- 
sipid to all who have once fully tasted the true Word of the 
living God. Even the poetry of the Koran never rises to 
the grandeur and sublimity of Job or Isaiah, the lyric beau- 
ty of the Psalms, the sweetness and loveliness of the Song 
of Solomon, the sententious wisdom of the Proverbs and 
Ecclesiastes. 

A few instances must suffice. 

The first Sura, called "The Sura of Praise and Prayer," 
which is recited by the Mussulmans in each of the five dai- 
ly devotions, fills for them the place of the Lord's Prayer, 
and contains the same number of petitions. We give it in 
a literal translation: 

" i. In the name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful. 

2. Praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds! 

3. The Compassionate, the Merciful. 

4. King on the day of reckoning! 

5. Thee only do we worship, and to thee do we cry for help. 

6. Guide thou us on the straight path. 

7. The path of those to whom thou hast been gracious — 
With whom thou art not angry, 

And who go not astray. Amen." 

As this Sura invites a comparison with the Lord's 
Prayer, infinitely to the advantage of the latter, so do the 
Koran's descriptions of Paradise when contrasted with 
John's vision of the heavenly Jerusalem: 

"Joyous on that day shall be the inmates of Paradise in their employ; 
In shades, on bridal couches reclining, they and their spouses. 
Therein shall they have fruits, and whatever they require. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

'Peace! ' shall be the word on the part of a merciful Lord, 

* But be ye separated this day, O ye sinners! ' 

******* 

The sincere servants of God, 

A stated banquet shall they have 

Of fruits, and honored shall they be 

In the gardens of delight, 

Upon couches face to face. 

A cup shall be borne round among them from a fountain, 
Limpid, delicious to those who drink; 

It shall not oppress the sense, nor shall they therewith be drunken, 
And with them are the large-eyed ones with modest refraining glance, 
fair like the sheltered egg." 

The fundamental dogma of Islam is contained in the 
ever-repeated phrase, " There is no deity but Allah, and 
Mohammed is his apostle." (La ilaha ill' allah, wa Muham- 
medarrasuM llah.) The first clause is true, and borrowed 
from the Old Testament (Deut. 6: 4); the second clause is 
an error which corrupts the truth. The source of its power 
and the secret of its success lie in the intense and fanatical 
monotheism of Islam. Its historical mission consists in the 
destruction of heathen idolatry. But this monotheism, like 
the Jewish and the Unitarian monotheism, is abstract and 
monotonous. It excludes the fullness of life and the inner- 
trinitarian relations as well as the outer-trinitarian mani- 
festations of the Deity. It is hostile to the divinity of 
Christ and of the Holy Spirit. The Mohammedan God is 
not a loving father of trusting children, but a despotic 
sovereign of trembling subject slaves. Pie has from eterni- 
ty ordained all things, evil as well as good. The Moham- 
medan doctrine of predestination is not Calvinistic, but 
fatalistic. It breeds a fierce fanaticism in the propagation 
of religion, and a stolid submission to unalterable fate. 
Islam— that is, unconditional resignation to the unchange- 
able will of Allah— is the chief virtue. He who dies fight- 
ing for his faith is sure to be saved. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 349 

The Mohammedan paradise is in the seventh heaven, 
and is the abode of perpetual youth and sensual delight 
for the faithful. Hell is beneath the lowest earth and seas 
of darkness, and is a place for everlasting punishment for 
all infidels, with seven stages for as many classes, viz., 
wicked Mohammedans, Christians, Jews, Sabians, Magians, 
idolaters, hypocrites. The bridge over hell is finer than a 
hair and sharper than the edge of a sword; the pious pass 
over it in a moment, the wicked fall from it into the abyss. 
The Moslems believe also in pure angels, good and evil 
genii, and devils whose chief is Iblis, or Satan. They 
believe in prophets and apostles, among whom Adam, 
Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed are the 
greatest. Jesus excels all except Mohammed, of whom he 
himself prophesied when he promised the Comforter who 
should lead his disciples into the whole truth. Jesus was 
born of the Virgin Mary, and was free from sin, but a mere 
man. He will return again and with Mohammed judge the 
whole world. 

The principal duties enjoined by the Koran are prayer, 
almsgiving, fasting (during the month of Ramadan), and 
pilgrimage to Mecca and Mount Arafat at least once in a 
man's lifetime, if possible. The less important duties and 
rites are abstinence from unclean animal food, from wine 
and all intoxicating liquor, from gambling and usury; also 
veracity (except in a few cases, and these have multiplied 
to many), probity, charity, cleanliness, decent attire, cir- 
cumcision. The law allows a man to have four wives 
(though most have only one or two), and as many concu- 
bine slaves as he pleases. Pashas, khaliffs, and sultans are 
not restricted in polygamy. Divorce is made easy. Sons 
inherit equal shares, but the share of a daughter is half 
that of a son. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The Mohammedan worship consists simply of prayers, 
with preparatory ablutions, and occasional preaching from 
the Koran. It resembles the Jewish and Protestant wor- 
ship, rather than the Roman or Greek Catholic. There is 
an entire absence of symbolical _ representations, which 
might distract the mind from the one and only object of 
worship. The prohibition in the second commandment is 
literally carried out. The Koran has no idea of an atone- 
ment, and hence no room for sacrifice, except the com- 
memoration of Ishmael's (Isaac's) sacrifice by Abraham. 
Allah is indeed "all merciful" and forgives sins, but arbi- 
trarily, without satisfaction of his justice. In this respect, 
as also in the doctrine of the abstract unity of the god- 
head, Islam resembles Socinianism and Unitarianism. It 
may be called the great Unitarian heresy of the East. " In 
the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful," is the 
phrase used at the beginning of every chapter of the Koram 
(except one), and of every other book, as also before 
every lawful and important act. The two words are from 
the same root, and have nearly the same meaning, with 
distinction, according to the Ulama (the professors of re- 
ligion and law), that "compassionate" means "merciful 
in great things," the other "merciful in small things." 
ButE. W. Lane (the author of that most instructive and 
reliable book, "The Modern Egyptians,'' and translator of 
-The Thousand and One Nights") says that "the first 
expresses an occasional sensation, the second a constant 
quality." 

Friday is observed as Sabbath, because on Friday 
Adam was created and died, and on Friday the world will 
be judged. On that day the Dancing and Howling Der- 
vishes ^perform their unique exercises, of which I shall 
speak afterwards. But the observance of Friday is not 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 351 

nearly as strict as the Jewish observance of the Sabbath. 
On the other hand, worship is not confined to that day. 
The mosques, like the Roman Catholic churches, are 
always open and frequented by worshipers, who perform 
their devotions either in groups or alone. 

The devotions of the pious Moslem are impressive, 
and put many Christians to shame. He says his prayers 
and goes through his bowings and prostrations regularly 
and punctually five times a day, in the mosque, or at 
home, or on board a ship, or in the street, or wherever he 
may be, regardless of his surroundings, being alone with 
his God in the midst of the crowd, his face turned toward 
Mecca, his hands raised to heaven, then laid on the lap, 
his knees bent, his forehead touching the ground. His 
usual prayer is the first Sura of the Koran, which serves 
him the same purpose as the Lord's Prayer does the Chris- 
tian. Sometimes a few other verses are added, and the 
ninety-nine beautiful names of Allah which form the Mo- 
hammedan rosary. There are five stated hours of prayer: 
between daybreak and sunrise, a little after noonday, in 
the afternoon, four minutes after sunset, and at nightfall. 
The Prophet fixed the seasons of prayer in this way to 
avoid the appearance of sun and star-worship, which he 
had to contend with in Arabia. The mueddin and muezzin 
(crier) announces the time of prayer from the minaret of 
each mosque, by chanting the " Adan," or call to prayer, 
in these or similar words: " God is most great. I testify 
that there is no deity but God. I testify that Mohammed 
is God's apostle. Come to prayer! Come to security! 
Prayer is better than sleeping. God is most great. There 
is no deity but God." 

Among the most curious features of Mohammedan 
worship are the exercises of the Dancing and Howling 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Dervishes, which I witnessed both at Cairo and at Con- 
stantinople (is Pera and Scutari) on Friday and Tuesday 
afternoon. The Dervishes are the Moslem monks. They 
perform their astounding feats of asceticism once a week 
in their mosques, and strangers are admitted on the pay- 
ment of a backsheesh. They carry certain forms of ascet- 
icism as far as the old Christian Anchorets or the Fakirs of 
India. 

The Dancing Dervishes, after the preliminary exercise 
of prayer and prostration, whirl around on their toes, ring 
within ring without touching each other, for about an hour, 
until they are utterly exhausted. I saw thirteen of them, 
all dressed in white flowing gowns, and with high white 
fezes of stiff woolen stuff; their hands were stretched out 
or raised to heaven, their eyes half closed; their mind was 
apparently absorbed in the contemplation of Allah. The 
performance consisted of four different acts, and I counted 
forty to fifty turnings in one minute. The spectacle is 
very exciting, and the dexterity and elasticity of their 
bodies are astonishing. The faces betrayed fanatical de- 
votion. But to my great amazement, I saw the next day 
one of these very Dervishes in a state of beastly intoxica- 
tion, reeling to and fro on the large bridge of the Golden 
Horn without observing anybody. This was a strange 
commentary on Mohammedan temperance. The higher 
classes, I understand, and it would seem from this excep- 
tional example even Dervishes, freely indulge in the use 
of strong brandy and champagne. The Howling Dervishes 
swing their heads up and down, crying incessantly with all 
their might, La ilaha UV Allah, and some other phrases, 
until they are stopped from sheer exhaustion. 

In entering a mosque, we may keep on the hat or 
turban, but must take off the shoes, or cover them with 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 355 

socks, or put on slippers in commemoration of the divine 
command to Moses, " Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, 
for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." 
Slippers or sandals of straw are usually provided at the 
entrance of these mosques, and must be paid for. There 
are always a half dozen claimants for backsheesh. 

Women are seldom seen in the mosques. The Koran 
does not command them to pray, and some Mohammedan 
philosophers doubt whether women have souls. Yet they 
are necessary for the bliss of their Paradise, where the 
humblest believer is allowed eighty thousand slaves and 
seventy-two wives besides those he had in this life, if he 
chooses to keep them. 

Islam is a religion of men, while Christianity has more 
followers among women. The one keeps women in a state 
of slavery and ignorance; the other raises her to true dig- 
nity and equality with man. In nothing is the superiority 
of Christian civilization over Mohammedanism so manifest 
as in the position of women and in the home life. Polyg- 
amy reduces woman to a mere slave and plaything, and is 
a fruitful source of domestic and social misery. Moham- 
med was comparatively temperate, but grew more sensual 
and cruel as he advanced in life and power. He was first 
married to a rich widow much older than himself (Chadi- 
jah), who bore him four daughters and two sons; two 
months after her death he married Sawda, another widow, 
and was betrothed at the same time to a mere girl of six or 
seven years, Ayesha, whose jealous hatred of Fatima (his 
only surviving daughter from Chadijah) became the cause 
of perpetual discords and schisms. He had in all fifteen 
regular wives and many concubines. He despised a 
throne and a diadem, he mended his own clothes, he 
pegged his own shoes, he lived on dates and water, in a 



356 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

poor cottage, surrounded by the cottages of his wives and 
slaves. His successors drink champagne, live in luxury, 
and have dozens of palaces and harems filled with eunuchs 
and women who know nothing beyond the vanities of eti- 
quette and dress. It is painful to add that the American 
Mohammed, Brigham Young, who died in September, 
1877, had nineteen wives and over fifty children, and left an 
immense fortune. 

Mohammed and the savage sons of the desert, by a 
fanatical faith, extreme simplicity and temperance, and 
fierce bravery, conquered the fairest portions of the East, 
plundering, enslaving, and destroying wherever they went, 
and reducing the lands of the Bible to a dreary ruin. His 
successors at the present day have to live at the mercy of 
Christian Europe. They have shamefully wasted their op- 
portunities, and the time of reckoning has come. The 
Mohammedan religion is indeed neither dead nor dying; a 
visit to its old University in Cairo, with ten thousand 
pupils, and its progress among the savage races in Africa, 
are sufficient to prove its vitality; but it has ceased to be a 
terror and insult to Europe; it must retreat to Asia, it is 
gradually undermined by changes in its own strongholds, 
and before long it will have to open the door for the mes- 
sengers of a purer Christianity than that which it so easily 
conquered, not by argument and . persuasion, but by the 
brute force of the sword, which by the slow but sure 
Nemesis of history is now turned against it * 

Thus it will be seen that Mohammed, the false proph- 
et who lived in the seventh century, borrowed from both 
the Old and New Testaments in formulating his religious 
system. What he took from these sources was added to 
his own views and promulgated as a revelation. From 

*Schaff, "Through Bible Lands." 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. $57 

time to time what purported to be new revelations were 
added to the Koran. At first he did not permit polygamy, 
but in after life, when he had grown sensual, he claimed to 
have had a special revelation permitting him to have as 
many wives as he pleased. The system is based upon 
sensuality, and the slavery and degradation of women are 
complete. 

One among the interesting sights in Cairo is the 
mosque El-Azhar which was converted into a university 
A. D. 975. It is said to be the largest school of the kind 
in the world, and is attended by students from all countries 
professing Islamism. It has ten thousand students in at- 
tendance. "They are instructed by three hundred and 
twenty teachers who are the most fanatical of all Moslems. 
The Koran really is the only text-book used in the universi- 
ty. It supplies the student with grammar, logic, law, phi- 
losophy and theology. There are other books, but they are 
simply commentaries on the Koran and its doctrines. The 
students sit crosslegged on mats with their teachers. The 
latter read from a book, explaining each sentence as they 
read; or they direct the more advanced students to read 
aloud, adding their own explanation from time to time. 
The students listen attentively, taking notes, and as soon 
as they can repeat the entire book which they are study- 
ing, the teacher makes a note of the fact in a copy-book, 
and authority to lecture upon the work is conferred upon 
them. In this way theology, law and philosophy are 
taught, the source of which is found in the Koran. It may 
be said that when the study of the Koran is completed 
(and the student must know it by heart) the education of 
the young man is completed, and he goes forth as a teach- 
er of Mohammedanism. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 3^9 

The teachers receive no salary either from the govern- 
ment or from the university. They make a living by 
serving in some religious position in the mosque, to which 
a salary is attached, in copying books (the Koran is never 
printed) and in teaching in private families; and they 
sometimes receive gifts from wealthy students. They lead 
lives of great simplicity and self-denial. The students 
remain in the university from three to six years. They 
pay no fees and are in many instances supported by alms. 
The place is devoid of comfort, and no chairs, benches, 
cots or beds are to be seen. They sleep on the floor, using 
their outer garment as a cover. Dr. Schaff says: "The 
simplicity and self-denial of this student life is something 
marvelous. Our theological students could not stand it 
a week." And we may add that students and teachers in 
many of our schools might learn useful lessons of self- 
denial at the university of El-Azhar. 

When it is remembered that in reality only the Koran 
is taught in the Mohammedan schools, we may form some 
idea of the intellectual condition of the Moslems at the 
present day. As one writer has very truthfully said, 
the most conspicuous defect of their culture consists in 
the entire absence of independent thought, in consequence 
of which they are the mere recipients of the knowledge ol 
the past. Their minds are thus exclusively occupied with 
the lowest grade of intellectual work, their principal task 
consisting in the systematic arrangement of the knowledge 
handed down to them. Some of the teachers of El-Azhar 
are men of marvelous erudition, but they are destitute of 
creative power, or of the ability to utilize their old mate- 
rials for the construction of any new edifice. They adhere 
faithfully to the notion of their forefathers, that the great- 
est triumph of mental labor is to learn by heart any work 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

of acknowledged literary value. With natural history they 
are wholly unacquainted; and even algebra, geometry and 
astronomy, so industriously studied by the ancient Arabi- 
ans, have now fallen into oblivion. So well satisfied are 
they with their own wisdom that they utterly despise the 
scientific pursuits of the western world* 

The great university of El-Azhar, as may easily be 
conjectured, is a hotbed of Moslem fanaticism, and so long 
as it prospers as it now does the doctrines of the false 
prophet will not lack for teachers. 

*BaedeKer, " Lower Egypt," page 287. 



CHAPTER XXI. 




The Land of Goshen.— Oppression of the Israelites.— The Buried Cities 
of Egypt.— Pithom a7id the Bricks made by the Hebrews.— Bricks 
without Straw.— Tahpanhes and Jeremiah the Prophet.— The 
Daughters of Zedekiah.— The Stones hid in the Brick Work.— 
Zoan.— The Burned Papyrus.— Great Statue of Rameses II. 

HEN Jacob gathered his family together, left the 
;; land which God had given to his fathers and came 
down into Egypt, he was kindly and courteously 
received by Pharaoh. Although he was a stranger and a 
sojourner in a strange land, yet he was welcomed as a 
friend. The king invited him to occupy the best of the 
country, even the Land of Goshen. It was a goodly land, 
rich in pasturage and all agricultural products. By proper 
care and irrigation the industrious farmer might reap three 
abundant harvests each year. The waters of the Nile were 
carried by a system of canals to all parts of the country. 
All the conditions existed here to make a people prosper- 
ous and happy. 

And here, in connection with the coming of Jacob and 
his sons into Egypt, we give the annexed engraving of the 
arrival of a Semitic family in that country. It is copied 
from one of the tombs at Beni Hassan. They are shep- 
herds and the leader of the party is presenting a Syrian 
goat to the governor of the district, to whom he is being 
introduced by a scribe who also makes a record of the 
presents brought to the monarch. That this family is from 

Palestine is generally admitted. The faces are Jewish or 
361 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 363 

Semitic. The men are represented as wearing beards, and 
a single glance at the engraving will show the marked dif- 
ference between them and the Egyptians. It is an inter- 
esting illustration and proves that it was the custom of the 
people of Palestine to go down into Egypt just as Abraham 
did, and as Jacob did after him. 

But we go back again to the Israelites. It was in the 
fruitful Land of Goshen that the sons of Jacob settled. 
Here they soon forgot the country from which they came 
out. They prospered, grew rich, multiplied and, as the 
years passed, became a mighty people. It was a growing 
nation in the midst of Egypt that first aroused the suspi- 
cions of and alarmed the Pharaoh that knew not Joseph. 
From his standpoint he no doubt concluded that he was 
acting wisely when he determined to oppress the Israelites. 
As we look at his course it does not betoken wisdom or 
statesmanship. A wise ruler delights in having his people 
contented and happy. He made their lives grievous by 
reason of the burdens laid upon them in the fields, in mak- 
ing brick, in the quarries, and in the temples and tombs 
constructed by the king. But God's plan differed from 
Pharaoh's, and the means adopted by the latter to enslave 
the people resulted in their final deliverance. 

During the first years of oppression Pharaoh 44 did set 
over them taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens. 
And they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and 
Raamses." Ex. i: n. 

In modern times the borders of the Land of Goshen 
have been the subject of much discussion. The treasure 
cities built for Pharaoh had fallen into ruins, and even the 
sites of them were lost. Where did the Israelites dwell in 
Egypt? Where was Pithom and where was Raamses locat- 
ed? These questions were often asked, and no satisfactory 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

answer could be given. But now,, thanks to the Egyptian 
Exploration Fund and the men having charge of the work, 
both the treasure cities have been identified and the Land 
of Goshen distinctly and authentically pointed out. Sin- 
gular as it may seem, these old cities named in Exodus 
have been excavated, and thus additional evidence of the 
truth of the Bible is secured. 

During our stay in Egypt we crossed and recrossed the 
Land of Goshen a number of times, and although it has 
been badly treated and some of the canals have been filled 
up, yet it is still a goodly land and produces rich harvests. 

It fills one with strange feelings to pass over these 
fields, ride along the banks of the canals, and to know that 
here the Israelites dwelt, and here they were compelled to 
make brick without straw. But stranger still is the fact 
that the evidence of their oppression has been hid away in 
the buried cities, and has only recently been brought to 
light by the spade and pick of the modern excavator. We 
give some of the most striking of these proofs. 

The story of the discovery of Pithom, Raamses, Tah- 
panhes and other buried cities of ancient Egypt is full of 
interest. The first two were built by the Israelites under 
the oppression, and the last is referred to by Jeremiah, so 
that these are not only cities of Egypt but Bible cities as 
well. Raamses and Pithom were located on the border of 
the Land of Goshen and on the route of the exodus. We 
are especially indebted to Edwards, Petrie, and Naville for 
the sketch we give of the discovery of these ancient cities. 

And first the discovery of Pithom. Some forty years 
ago a large mound, known in Egypt as Tell-el-Maskhutah, 
was identified by Lepsius as Raamses, and his opinion was 
generally accepted. In all the maps and guidebooks it is 
so set down. When M. Naville commenced the work of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 365 

excavating the mound in 1883 it was with the purpose of 
proving that Lepsius was correct; but much to his surprise 
he found that the learned German had made a mistake; not 
a serious mistake, however, for what M. Naville did find 
was the treasure city of Pithom, the twin sister of Raamses. 

Digging into and removing the mound a great wall 
twenty feet in thickness was found which enclosed a space 
containing fifty-five thousand square yards. In one corner 
of the square stood a temple, the outer wall of which was 
built of brick, the inner of fine limestone. It was found 
that the city had been founded by Rameses II, as was 
abundantly proved by the inscriptions discovered. Statues 
and hieroglyphic texts of later kings were also found on 
the spot, among which was a part of a tablet of the Shishak 
of the Bible. 

It was also discovered that the temple was dedicated 
to Turn, the patron god of the city, and that its sacred 
name was Pa-Turn. It was also called Sukut. An inscrip- 
tion on a black granite statue of a prince implores « all 
the priests who go into the sacred abode of Turn the great 
god of Sukut " to offer a prayer for him. Another inscrip- 
tion sets forth the titles of an " official of Turn of Sukut 
and governor of the storehouse." These inscriptions, with 
many others found, set forth that M. Naville had discov- 
ered a place that was a " storehouse " and that it had two 
names, Pa-Turn and Sukut. The surrounding district was 
also known by the latter name. 

" Now, « Pa-Tum ' means the house, or abode of Turn; 
'Pa' being the Egyptian word for house, or abode. Thus 
the temple gave its name to the city, just as ' Pa-Bast '— 
the abode of Bast— gave its name to the city which the 
Greeks called Bubastis. But as the Greeks,, according to 
the Greek method of transcription, rendered ' Pa ' by ' Bu,' 



j66 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and ' Bast ' by Bastis, so the Hebrews, according to the 
Hebrew method of transcription, rendered ' Pa' by ' Pi,' and 
< Bast ' by ' Beseth.' Thus it is as ' Pi-Beseth ' that we read 
of Bubastis. And so in like manner, the Hebrews changed 
'Pa' into 'Pi,' and 'Turn' into 'Thorn,' when dealing with 
' Pa-Turn ' of' which they made ' Pi-thorn.' Accordingly it 
is of this'very store fort, ' Pa-Turn,' that we read in the pas- 
sage, 'And they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pi-thom 

and Raamses.' "* 

But we are not yet done with the name of this impor- 
tant Bible city. It had, as we have seen from the inscrip- 
tions, another name, " Sukut," and this was changed by the 
Hebrew method into Succoth of the Bible. It will be re- 
membered that " the children of Israel removed from Ram- 
eses, and pitched in Succoth,"! so that we not only have 
the storehouse of Pithom, but we have as well the second 
camping-place of the Israelites as they fled away from the 
land of bondage. And not only this, we also have the very 
place where Joseph met his aged father when he came 
down into Egypt. "And Joseph made ready his chariot, 
and went up to meet Israel his father, to Goshen, and pre- 
sented himself unto him; and he fell on his neck, and wept 
on his neck a good while." Gen. 46: 20. It is well known 
that the Greeks in later times gave the name of Heroopolis 
to Pithom, and when the Hebrew Bible was translated into 
the Greek by the seventy at Alexandria, about B. C. 200 
they give the place the Greek name and say that Joseph 
"made ready his chariot and went np to HeroOpolis to 
meet his father." 

Inside the wall, which we have described as surround- 
ing the city and the temple, M. Naville discovered a great 

*» Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers," page 45- 

fNum. 33: =)• . . ;| 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



367 



number of deep cellars and store chambers. These under- 
ground vaults, granaries or magazines are solidly-built 
square chambers of various sizes, divided by massive parti- 
tion walls about ten feet in thickness, without doors or any 
kind of communication, evidently destined to be filled and 
emptied from the top by the means of trap doors and lad- 
ders. Except the corner occupied by the temple, the 
whole area of the great walled enclosure is honeycombed 
with these cellars. When it is remembered that the enclo- 
sure contains fifty-five thousand square yards some idea of 
the vast extent of the store chambers may be formed. 

They are built of brick. These are large and are made 
of Nile mud pressed in a wooden mould and dried in the 
sun. " Also they are laid in mortar, which is not common, 
the ordinary method being to lay them with mud, which 
dries immediately and holds almost as well as mortar. 
And this reminds us that Pharaoh's taskmasters 'made the 
children of Israel to serve with rigor: and they made their 
lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick.'* 
We remember all the details of that pitiful story — how the 
straw became exhausted; how the poor souls were driven 
forth to gather in stubble for mixing with clay; and yet 
how they were required to give in as large a tale of bricks 
at the end of each day's work as if the straw had been duly 
provided. 

" Now it is a very curious and interesting fact that the 
Pithom bricks are of different qualities. In the lower 
courses of these massive cellar walls they are mixed with 
chopped straw; higher up, where the straw maybe supposed 
to have run short, the clay is found mixed with reeds, — the 
same kind of reeds which grow to this day in the old 
Pharaohic canal, and which are translated as 1 stubble ' in 

*Ex. 1: 13, 14. 



368 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

the Bible. Finally, when the last reeds were used up, the 
bricks of the upper courses consist of mere Nile mud, with 
no binding substance whatever. 

" So here we have the whole pathetic Bible narrative 
surviving in solid substance to the present time. We go 
clown to the bottom of one of these cellars. We see the 
good brick for which the straw was provided, some few feet 
higher we see those for which the wretched Hebrews had 
to seek reeds, or stubble. We hear them cry aloud, ' Can 
we make bricks without straw?' Lastly we see the bricks 
which they had to make, and did make without straw, 
while their hands were bleeding and their hearts were 
breaking. Shakespeare in one of his most familiar pas- 
sages tells us of 4 sermons in stones;' but here we have a 
sermon in bricks, and not only a sermon, but a practical 
historical commentary of the highest importance and in- 
terest."* 

It seems remarkable indeed that the bricks of Pithom 
made by the children of Israel should bear such • abundant 
testimony to the truth of the Bible narrative. And yet this 
is true. In God's own time the treasure city was excavat- 
ed, and thousands of silent but eloquent witnesses were 
taken from the buildings in which they had been placed by 
Pharaoh's builders. And what a wonderful testimony 
these silent witnesses bear to the truth of the Bible! How 
marvelously do the very bricks of the ancient treasure city, 
built by the children of Israel under the hand of the op- 
pressor, cry out as with living tongues and repeat the old, 
old Bible story, telling in unmistakable language that 
Pharaoh oppressed the sons of Jacob and compelled them 
to make brick without straw. Who can examine these 

* " Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers," pages 49, So, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 369 

evidences and doubt the truth of the Bible account of 
Israel's bondage and oppression in the land of Egypt! 

And here we refer to other testimony bearing on the 
bondage of Israel in Egypt. Letters, written on papyrus 
by the king's scribe, Kauiser, during the reign of Rameses 
II, the Pharaoh of the oppression, were found in the tem- 
ple at Memphis, and are now in the museum at Leyden. 
They were found in a good state of preservation, and have 
been carefully translated into English. The following 
passages occur: " I have obeyed the orders of the master, 
being bidden to serve out the rations to my soldiers, and 
also to the Aperian (the Egyptian name for the Hebrews) 
who quarry stone for the palace of King Rameses." 
"Therefore I heard the message of the eye (an official 
title) of my master, saying: 'Give corn to the Egyptian 
soldiers, and to the Hebrews who polish stones for the con- 
struction of the great storehouse in the City Rameses.' " 
Another letter, written by the scribe Keniamami, telh of 
the Hebrews quarrying stones for a building on the south 
side of Memphis. 

Of these letters Miss Edwards, in her excellent work 
on Egypt, says: "They bring home to us with startling 
nearness the events and actors of the Bible narrative. We 
see the toilers at their tasks, and the overseers conferring* 
with the directors of public works. They extract from the 
quarry those huge blocks which are our wonder to-day. 
Harnessed to huge sledges, they drag them to the 
river-side and embark them for transport to the opposite 
bank. Some are so heavy that it takes a month to get 
them down from the mountain to the landing-place. 
Other laborers elsewhere are making bricks, digging 
canals, helping to build the great wall which reached from 
Pelusium to Heliopolis, and strengthened the defenses of 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



371 



not only Rameses and Pithom, but of a]! the cities and 
ports of the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, Their lot is 
hard, but not harder than the lot of other workmen. They 
are well fed. They intermarry. They increase and multi- 
ply. The season of the great oppression is not yet come. 
They make bricks, it is true, and those who are thus em- 
ployed must supply a certain number daily, but straw is 
not yet withheld, and the task, though perhaps excessive, 
is not impossible." 

But the day of oppression was close upon them. 
Rameses, alarmed at the rapid growth of the Israelites, 
took measures to retard their increase. " And they made 
their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in 
brick, and in all manner of service in the field: all their 
service, wherein they made them serve, was with rigour." 
And then, as we have already seen, came still harder tasks. 
The straw used in making brick was withheld, and yet the 
full number was required. " So the people were scattered 
abroad throughout all the land of Egypt to gather stubble 
instead of straw." 

The annexed engraving shows the process of making 
bricks in ancient Egypt, and it doubtless shows just how 
the Israelites worked. After the discovery of Pithom M. 
Naville continued his work under the auspices of the 
Egyptian Exploration Fund, and in 1884 discovered at Saft 
el-Henneh what is supposed to have been the capital city 
of the Land of Goshen, the home of the Israelites so many 
years during their sojourn in Egypt. It is said there is 
very strong reason for believing that an old city that 
stood here was rebuilt and enlarged by Rameses II, to 
which he gave his own name, and that in " Kes," "Goshen," 
we have the other treasure city built by the Hebrews at the 
time of the oppression. Raamses was the place from 



372 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

which the Israelites started on their journey to the Land of 
Canaan, and they would most likely have assembled at the 
capital of the country in which they dwelt. From this and 
other considerations in all probability Saft el-Henneh, as it 
is now called, is the Raamses of the Bible. 

We now turn from the important work of M. Naville, 
which has yielded such rich fruit, to the no less important 
discoveries of Mr. Petrie whose interesting work, "Ten 
Years Digging in Egypt," and reports to the Egyptian Ex- 
ploration Fund are invaluable to those who desire to make 
a careful study of recent discoveries in Egypt. Mr. Petrie 
commenced his work in 1886 at a group of mounds called 
Tell Defenneh, situated close to lake Menzaleh at the 
northeastern corner of the delta. " Defenneh " is an Arab 
word derived from Daphnae, the Greek name of the place. 
In the Hebrew "Daphnae" is transcribed Tahpanhes, so 
that we have in the mounds at Tell Defenneh the ruins of 
the Bible city of Tahpanhes. 

The occasion of the mention of Tahpanhes in the Bible 
was on this wise. In the reign of Pharaoh-hophra * about 
B. C. 585, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, besieged and 
took the City of Jerusalem. Zedekiah was taken captive, 
his eyes were put out and with the largest part of the in- 
habitants of Jerusalem and Judea was carried into Babylo- 
nian captivity .f Jerusalem was occupied by a Chaldean 
garrison and ruled by a governor sent from Babylon by 
Nebuchadnezzar. The king's daughters and a remnant of 
the Israelites, including Jeremiah the prophet, remained in 
the city. His advice and counsel was to remain in Jerusa- 
lem; but Johanan, the son of Kareah, who had charge of 
the king's daughters, determined to take chem and the 

* Jer. 44: 30. 
f 2 Kings 2$:7- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS 



373 



remnant of Judah to Egypt and place them under the pro- 
tection of Pharaoh-hophra. Jeremiah prophesied against 
this scheme and said: "And now therefore hear the word 
of the Lord, ye remnant of Judah; Thus saith the Lord of 
hosts, the God of Israel; If ye wholly set your faces to en- 
ter into Egypt, and go to sojourn there; then it shall 
come to pass, that the sword, which ye feared, shall over- 
take you there in the land of Egypt, and the famine, 
whereof ye were afraid, shall follow close after you there in 
Egypt; and there ye shall die. So shall it be with all the 
men that set their faces to go into Egypt to sojourn there; 
they shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the 
pestilence: and none of them shall remain or escape from 
the evil that I will bring upon them."* 

But the words of the prophet were of no avail. Joha- 
nan and his adherents had wholly set their faces to go to 
Egypt to sojourn there. The words of the prophet were 
an idle tale to them. They accused him of speaking 
falsely and said: "The Lord our God hath not sent thee to 
say, Go not into Egypt to sojourn there. "f Here is the 
old story of men finding excuses for disobeying the Word 
of the Lord. It was a common thing in the days of Joha- 
nan, and it is by no means less common to-day. These men 
had marked their course and no words of the aged prophet 
could change their minds. To Egypt they had determined 
to go, and to Egypt they went. 

" But Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the captains 
of the forces, took all the remnant of Judah, that were re- 
turned from all nations, whither they had been driven, to 
dwell in the land of Judah; even men, and women, and 
children, and the king's daughters, and every person that 

* Jer. 42: 15-17 
t Jer. 43: 2. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard had left .... 
and Jeremiah the prophet, and Baruch the son of Nenah. 
So they came into the land of Egypt: for they obeyed not 
the voice of the Lord: thus came they even to Tahpan- 

heS * Nine hundred years before this the oppressed Israel- 
ites had fled away from Egypt, and now a remnant of that 
once prosperous people, all that were left in Palestine, fled 
to Egypt and took protection from the Chaldeans from 
Pharaoh-hophra. It was an exodus from the Land of 
Canaan to Egypt. The king of Egypt placed his royal 
palace at Daphnae at the disposal of the princesses and 
granted those who came with them a large tract of land. 

One of those who accompanied Johanan to Egypt we 
may well suppose came unwillingly. It was the prophet of 
the Lord, Jeremiah. He had protested with all his power 
and zeal against the move; he had prophesied against it, 
and after all was compelled to be an unwilling participant 
in it But his voice was not hushed. They were now en- 
joying the rich bounty and hospitality of the king of 
Egypt, they were in the fertile land of the Nile, but the 
prophet lifted up a warning voice upon the very threshold 
of the palace which the Jewish princesses occupied, and he 
spoke these words: 

-Then came the word of the Lord unto Jeremiah in 
Tahpanhes, saying, Take great stones in thine hand, and 
hidef them in mortar in the brickwork, which is at the en- 
try of Pharaoh's house in Tahpanhes, in the sight of the 
men of Judah; and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of 
hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will send and take 
Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will 



tMar^ind reading, or, lay them with mortar in the pavement (ox square), ^ 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



37£ 



set his throne upon these stones that I have hid; and he 
shall spread his royal pavilion over them. And he shall 
come, and shall smite the land of Egypt; such as are for 
death shall be given to death, and such as are for captivity 
to captivity, and such as are for the sword to the sword."* 

Bearing in mind what has preceded we shall now fol- 
low Mr. Petrie in his excavations at Tahpanhes; and we 
cannot do better than give the graphic description of his 
work by the gifted and lamented author of " Pharaohs, 
Fellahs and Explorers," with the report of Mr. Petrie to 
the secretary of the Egyptian Exploration Fund, made in 
April, 1886, which is quoted in the foregoing excellent 
work: When Mr. Petrie arrived at the scene of his labors 
he found three mounds; two of them were apparently mere 
rubbish heaps of the ordinary type; the third being entirely 
composed of burned and blackened ruins, of a huge pile of 
brick buildings, visible for a great distance across the 
plain. Arriving at his destination in the evening, foot-sore 
and weary, Mr. Petrie beheld this singular object standing 
high against a lurid sky, and reddened by a fiery sunset. 
His Arabs hastened to tell him its local name; and he may 
be envied the delightful surprise with which he learned 
that it was known far and near as " El Kasr el Bint el 
Yahudi" — the " Castle of the Jew's Daughter." 

He at once set to work with some forty or fifty Arab 
laborers and soon discovered that the ruins had been 
burned and that it once had been a palace and a fort. Re- 
ferring now to the ''brickwork" of the Revised Version 
and the " brickkiln " of the King James translation the ex- 
plorer says: 

"This 'brickwork, or pavement,' at the entry of 
Pharaoh's house has always been a puzzle to translators; 

* Revised Version, Jer. 43: 8-1 1. 



376 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

but as soon as we began to uncover the plan of the palace, 
the exactness of the description was manifest; for here, 
outside the buildings adjoining the central tower, I found 
by repeated trenchings an area of continuous brickwork 
resting on sand, and measuring about one hundred feet by 
sixty feet, facing the buildings at the east corner. 

" The roadway ran up a recess between the buildings 
and this platform, which has no traces of superstructures, 
was evidently an open air place for loading and unloading 
goods, or sitting out in the air, or transacting business, or 
conversing— just such a place, in fact, as is made by the 
Egyptians to this day in front of their houses, where they 
drink coffee, and smoke in the cool of the afternoon, and 
receive their visitors. 

"Such seems to have been the object of this large plat- 
form, which was evidently a place to meet persons who 
would not be admitted into the palace or fort; to assemble 
guards; to hold levees; to receive tribute and stores; to un- 
lade goods; and to transact the multifarious business which, 
in so hot a climate, is done in the open air. This platform 
is therefore, unmistakably, the brickwork, or pavement, 
which is at the 4 entry of Pharaoh's house in Tahpanhes.' 
The rains* have washed away this area and denuded the 
surface, so that, although it is two or three feet thick near 
the palace, it is reduced in greater part to a few inches, and 
is altogether gone at the northwest corner." 

Now the Arabic word for a platform of this kind is 
"balat," and that we have in this "balat" the brickwork 
referred to in the Bible is scarcely to be doubted by the 
most determined sceptic. And it is to be noted that in the 
alternative or marginal reading, above mentioned, "the 
brickwork which is at the entry of Pharaoh's house " is 

* There are frequent rainfalls in the northern part of the delta of Egypt. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 377 

rendered as " the pavement or square." Here, therefore, 
the ceremony described by Jeremiah must have been per- 
formed, and it was upon this spot that Nebuchadnezzar was 
to spread his royal pavilion. It will be asked, perhaps, if 
Mr. Petrie actually found the stones which Jeremiah laid 
with mortar in the thickness of that pavement. He looked 
for them, of course, turning up the brickwork in every 
part; and he did find some large stones lying loosely on the 
surface. But these had probably rolled down from the 
wreck of the palace* At all events, it was impossible to 
identify them. 

Meanwhile we turn in vain to the pages of sacred and 
secular history for some record of the fate of these hapless 
princesses— the last, the very last, of the ancient and noble 
royal line of Judah who were recognized as royal. What 
fate befell them and their followers? Did the Assyrian 
pursue them with fire and sword? And was the conquer- 
or's pavilion actually spread upon the spot marked by the 
prophet? The Bible tells us no more; but certain Egyptian 
inscriptions state that Nebuchadnezzar again invaded 
Egypt, and was defeated by Apries Pharaoh-hophra; while, 
on the other'hand, certain Babylonian inscriptions give the 
victory to Nebuchadnezzar. Which are we to believe? 
For my part, I unhesitatingly accept the impartial evidence 
of that burned and blackened pile, ''The Castle of the 
Jews' Daughter;" and I do not doubt that the invincible 
Assyrian wrought his uttermost vengeance upon the "rem- 
nant of Judah." 

Nor must we forget the additional testimony of the 
clay cylinders of Nebuchadnezzar, inscribed in cuneiform 

* May it not be possible, is it not altogether probable that these stones may have been 
loosened from the pavement where they were laid by Jeremiah? Their presence at this 
place would be a strong proof that these may have been the very stones placed there by 
the prophet. J 



jj,g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

characters, and now in the National Egyptian Museum. 
Some seven or eight years ago these cylinders were sold to 
Prof Maspero by an Arab who found them, as we have 
every reason to believe, upon this very spot; and such cyl- 
inders were precisely the memorials which Nebuchadnez- 
zar would have left buried beneath the spot where he 
spread his pavilion and planted his royal standard in the 

hour of victory.* 

So Tahpanhes, buried away long centuries ago by the 
accumulated rubbish and dust of ages, speaks now at the 
close of the nineteenth century, bearing testimony to the 
truth of the Bible. What will those critics, who claim that 
the Old Testament was written just before the beginning of 
the Christian era, now have to say in the face of this posi- 
tive proof that they are mistaken? Here at Tahpanhes we 
have a meeting point of ancient Greek, Egyptian, Assyrian 
and Bible history, and the chronology of the Look of 
Teremiah is settled beyond all dispute, fhe date is fixed 
'at nearly six hundred years before Christ. Then, too how 
wonderfully does the discovery of Tahpanhes corroborate 
the statements made by the prophet, and how it clears up 
the difficulty which translators have had for years with the 
"brickkiln" and the "brickwork" before the house of 
Pharaoh. Thus are the buried cities of the Bible being ex- 
cavated, and as they again see the light of the sun after so 
many centuries of darkness and silence, they speak as with 
human voices, saying, " The Book of God is true.' 

Mr Petrie continued his work at Tahpanhes and made 
a number of interesting discoveries, but none to exceed 
that of the discovery of brickwork before the house of 
Pharaoh. The palace and fort consisted of one enormous 
square tower, consisting of sixteen rooms on each floor; 

* " Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers," page 67. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 379 

while, built up against its outer walls, were a variety of 
larger structures, such as might have been added for guard 
rooms, offices, and the accommodation of the court. There 
was every evidence that the place had been taken by as- 
sault, plundered, and burned, the upper stories of the tower 
having fallen in and buried the basements. Layer by layer 
Mr. Petrie cleared away these masses of buried rubbish- 
each layer a chapter in the history of the place. The royal 
apartments had once been lined with fine limestone slabs 
exquisitely sculptured and painted; but these had been lit- 
erally mashed to pieces before the place was set on fire, 
and lay in splincered heaps among the debris of charred 
beams and blackened bricks. Under the foundation cor- 
ners of the stronghold were found libation vessels, corn 
nibbers, specimens of ores, model bricks, the bones of a 
sacrificial ox and a small bird, and a series of little tablets 
in gold, silver, lapis lazuli, porcelain, carnelian, and jasper, 
engraved with the names and titles of the royal founder 
Psammetichus I. 

Under the immense mound of rubbish the basement 
chambers were uninjured. The kitchen was as it had been 
left centuries ago. In a large room with recesses in the 
wall which served for a pantry were fourteen jars and two 
dishes standing in their places. Here also were found 
weights for weighing the meat, spits, knives, plates, cups 
and saucers. In another room were found empty wine jars, 
some perfect, some broken, and this was undoubtedly the 
wine room of the palace. 

A great variety of objects from the royal apartments 
were found in the fallen rubbish, such as bronze and silver 
rings, amulets, beads, seals, small brass vessels, a grand 
sword-handle with curved guard, and a quantity of burned 
and rusted scale armor. The palace and fort stood in the 



gg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

midst of a great camp. In the camp were found many 
military relics, belonging to Greek soldiers who assisted 
Psammetichus in securing his throne. A massive gold 
handle, apparently the handle of a tray, was also found 
buried in a corner of the camp, where doubtless it had been 
hidden by some plunderer when the place had been plun- 
dered and burned. This undoubtedly formed part of 
Hophra's service of gold plate (that service of gold plate 
which he would, of course, have placed at the disposal of 
his Jewish guests), and it is, with one exception, the only 
piece of gold plate ever found in Egypt * 

We close this chapter with a brief reference to the 
work of Mr. Petrie at Tsan, the " Tanis " of the Greeks, and 
rendered Zoan in the Hebrew. We are informed in the 
Bible that " Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in 
Egypt,"t and that the Lord did marvelous things in the 
sight of the fathers of Israel " in the land of Egypt, in the 
field of Zoan."I The identification of Tanis with Zoan 
brought to light another buried city of the Bible. We may 
be able to enter somewhat into the feelings of the excava- 
tor by reading what Mr. Petrie says about some of his dis- 
coveries: 

-But the burnt houses were the real prize of the sea- 
son, as the owners had fled and left most of their goods; 
and the reddened patches of earth attracted us usually to a 
profitable site. In one house there was a beautiful marble 
term, of Italian work; and the fragments of a very curious 
zodiac, painted on a sheet of clear glass over a foot square, 
each sign or month having an emblematic head to repre- 
sent it; unhappily, it was broken in a hundred and fifty 

* "Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers," pages 65, 67. 
f Lev. 13: 22. 

iPs. 78:12. i-Urt?"*" ' tffl 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



381 



pieces, and as I uncovered them it was cruel to see the 
gold-foil work which was on them peel off on to the earth, 
leaving the glass bare in many parts. A yet more heart- 
rending sight were the piles of papyrus rolls so rotted that 
they fell to pieces with a touch, showing here and there a 
letter of the finest Greek writing. The next house, also 
burnt, was the best of all. Here we found the limestone 
statuette of the owner, Bakakhuiu, inscribed in demotic on 
the base; a sensible, sturdy-looking, active man, who seems 
to have been a lawyer or notary, to judge by his docu- 
ments. Many household objects of pottery and stone were 
found, jars, mortars, etc., and a beautiful blue glazed jar, 
perhaps the largest such known and quite perfect. The 
rich result however was in his waste; for in a recess under 
the cellar stairs had been five baskets of old papyri. 
Though many had utterly perished by being burnt to white 
ash, yet one basketful was only carbonized; and tenderly un- 
dermining the precious black mass, I shifted it out and car- 
ried it up to my house with fear and reverent joy. It took 
ten hours' work to separate safely all the documents, twist- 
ed, crushed, and squeezed together, and all as brittle as 
only burnt papyrus is; a bend or a jerk, and the piece was 
ruined. At last I had over a hundred and fifty documents 
separated; and, each wrapped apart, and put in tin boxes 
in which they traveled safely. They have now all been 
opened, and glazed; and two of them already prove to be 
of the greatest interest. One is a book of hieroglyphic 
signs in columns, followed by their hieratic equivalents and 
the school name by which they were learned: the greater 
part of this is preserved, and shows us, for the first time, 
the system on which the hieroglyphics were arranged and 
taught."* When the care that must be taken in opening 

* " Ten Years' Digging in Egypt," Win. M. Flinders Petrie, pages 33, 34. 



^g 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

up these relics of the past is considered we are not sur- 
prised at the statement that excavators, like poets, are 

born, not made. 

Bearing in mind what Mr. Petrie says about the burnt 
houses in Zoan, evidences of a great conflagration, we turn 
to Ezek. 30: 14, and read the following prophecy concern- 
ing this and other cities of ancient Egypt: "And I will 
make Pathros desolate, and I will set fire in Zoan, and will 
execute judgments in No." 

It was also in Zoan that Mr. Petrie discovered the re- 
mains of the largest statue ever sculptured by man. It is 
needless to add that this colossus represented the great 
Egyptian egotist, Rameses II. It had been ruthlessly 
cut up by one of his successors and used to build a gate 
for a large temple. It was from the fallen blocks of this 
gateway that the excavator recognized that he had before 
him a great statue. Of this immense statue Miss Edwards 
says that the parts discovered proved to be the most stu- 
pendous colossus known. Those statues which approach 
nearest to him in size are the Colossi of Abou Simbel, and of 
Thebes. These, however, are all seated figures and are cut 
in comparatively soft materials. But the statue of Rame- 
ses II at Zoan was not only sculptured in the hard red 
granite of Assuan, and designed upon a larger scale than 
any of these, but he stood erect and crowned, ninety-two 
feet high from top to toe, or one hundred and twenty-five 
feet high including his pedestal. The weight of the whole 
mass is calculated by Mr. Petrie at twelve hundred tons. 
We ask ourselves in amazement how so huge a mass or 
granite in one solid piece was taken unbroken from the 
quarry; how it was floated from Assuan to Zoan, a distance 
of not' less than seven hundred miles; how it was raised 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 38^ 

into its place when it reached its destination.* What won- 
derful sculptors and builders those old Egyptians were! 
H ow the great statue of Rameses II must have towered 
above all else, and looked out over the field of Zoan! 

* " Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers," page 53. 



CHAPTER XXII. 




The Land of Goshen.— The Sakkieh.— The Boundaries of Goshen.— 
The Rich, Fertile Soil— The Israelites and their Murmuring.— A 
long Donkey Ride .—Raising Water with the Basket.— A Village 
Market— Lost on the Desert.— The Beduin Sheik — Wading in 
Mud and Water.— The Donkey-boys.— Ac hmet AH our Drago- 
man. — A Sorrowful Man. 

"And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy. brethren are come 
unto thee: the land of Egypt is before thee; in the best of the land make thy father and 
brethren to dwell; in the land of Goshen let them dwell: and if thou knowest any men of 
activity among them, then make them rulers over my cattle."— Gen. 47: S, 6. 



lUE Land of Goshen again. Egypt has its pyramids, 
its obelisks, its ruined temples, its colossal statues, 
its wonderful tombs and its buried cities, each of 
which has an interest peculiar to itself, but none are more 
interesting to the Bible student than the Land of Goshen. 
This small, fertile territory, watered by the Nile, was the 
birthplace of a nation whose history and religion have had 
a wonderful influence upon the human race, an influence 
that was destined to be felt long after the mighty nation 
who received Jacob and his sons as guests had passed 
away, and an influence that is destined to be felt through 
the line of Judah to the end of time. 

When Pharaoh spoke to Joseph concerning his father 
and his brethren and told him to let them dwell in the best 
of the land of Egypt, "in the land of Goshen let them 
dwell," they numbered in all but seventy souls. When 
these same Hebrews were led away from the land of bond- 
age and oppression by Moses, they had increased so that 

'384 ' w ■ 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 387 

of their number six hundred thousand from twenty years 
old and upward were " able to go forth to war in Israel." * 
They had come down into Egypt a single family with the 
aged grandfather still with them; they went forth with a 
strong army, with a great multitude of women and chil- 
dren, old men and youths. They came down to Egypt a 
little band of poverty-stricken wanderers, seeking food for 
their wives and little ones, they went forth a unified nation, 
ready to play its part in the great drama of the world's 
history. 

We could wish that we had more of the personal 
history of these dwellers in the Land of Goshen (the 
Gosem of the Egyptian). The Bible passes over the many 
years of their sojourn with but few recorded events, and 
from the time of their settlement and the death of Jacob 
and Joseph until there arose a new king over Egypt who 
knew not Joseph, we are without information as to the life 
and doings of the sons of Jacob. As they were an alien 
race and as the years went by were subjected to slavery, 
the Egyptians left but few records touching the Hebrews. 
We find some references to them in the temples and on 
the monuments, where they are represented as slaves and 
toilers. 

In the fruitful Land of Goshen they must have dwelt 
many years, a happy, prosperous people, before the years 
of oppression came. The rich pasture-land afforded them 
abundant provender for their herds and flocks, for they 
were shepherds, both they and their fathers.f Under these 
most favorable conditions it is not to be wondered at that 
the Hebrews "were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and 

*Num. 1: 3 
f Gen. 47: 3. 



^88 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was 
filled with them;"* that is, the Land of Goshen. 

But the ancient records are not silent as to the rich- 
ness of the soil of Goshen. An ancient Egyptian papyrus, 
written by Egyptian officials during the period of Israel's 
sojourn in Goshen, is preserved and bears testimony to the 
great fertility of the soil. "They describe the beauty and 
the charms of the country in the most vivid colors, stating 
that life there was sweet and pleasant, and that the soil 
produced all kinds of crops in great abundance." These 
records show how literally true is the statement contained 
in the Scripture standing at the head of this chapter: 
"In the best of the land make thy father and brethren to 
dwell." 

Passing over the Land of Goshen and noting the won- 
derful fertility of the soil and the prosperity of the people 
who now dwell here, with a knowledge of what it was in 
the days of Israel's sojourn, we can well understand some 
of the incidents in the life of those people. Dwelling here, 
as they did, in the midst of plenty, in the richest agricul- 
tural district in the world, with every earthly desire grati- 
fied, they would never have been willing to follow Moses 
into' the sandy wilderness which bordered their rich farms 
had not their lives been made bitter and grievous by op- 
pression. God works by means, and this was the means 
used to wean the Israelites away from the pleasant Land 
of Goshen. There they were losing their knowledge of 
the true God and were partaking of the idolatrous religion 
of the Egyptians. God led them out from under a terrible 
slavery, by the hand of his servant Moses, and by a disci- 
pline of forty years in the wilderness prepared them for 
the land in which they were to dwell. 



*Ex. 1:7. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 389 

Then, too, with the goodly Land of Goshen in mind 
it is easy to understand why they so fondly and longingly 
looked back to the fleshpots of Egypt, and why they said 
to Moses when they had been led into the terrible wilder- 
ness of Sin, "Would to God we had died by the hand of 
the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh 
pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have 
brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole 
assembly with hunger." 

It all seems plain enough now, and natural enough, 
too, as we traverse the fertile plain of Goshen and remem- 
ber that this is the land in which the Israelites dwelt. 
And then when we pass over the green border of the fertile 
plain and enter the silent, mysterious desert with sand 
everywhere, and remember that it was this dreary, desolate 
wilderness into which the people had been led, all wonder 
that they murmured ceases. How they must have 
dreamed, as they slept on the sands of the desert, of the 
green fields, the palm groves, and the sweet, life-giving 
waters of the Nile, of their granaries bursting with plenty, 
and of the kettles over the fire, never wanting for an 
abundant supply of flesh. To awake from such a dream 
in a howling wilderness, with sand and desolation every- 
where, was to take the heart back again to the land they 
had left. Under such circumstances and such surround- 
ings, they would have forgotten the oppression and bitter- 
ness of their lives and thought only of the blessings they 
had lost. It is all plain enough now and we wonder no 
more as we once did, years ago, why the children of Israel 
murmured and turned back in their hearts to the " flesh- 
pots of Egypt." The whole proceeding is entirely in line 
with human nature, and only shows how true the Bible 
account is, even in the minutest details. 



3gO WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

As we write these lines, the thought comes to us, How 
much better are professing Christians to-day, with the 
light of the Gospel and all the advantages of a high state 
of civilization, than were the ignorant, oppressed Hebrews 
who murmured in the wilderness of Sin? How many who 
profess Christ are not only looking back, but going back, 
to the fleshpots of the world? Is not the Christian church 
moving worldward? Is she not much more blameworthy 
than were the Israelites? Will she go on until she is 
swallowed by the great whirlpool of worldlyism? 

Fathers and mothers in the Israel of God, dear young 
Christian lambs of the flock of Christ Jesus, will you not 
keep your eyes and your hearts fixed on the blessed, holy 
Land of Canaan and leave the world of fashion and folly 
to the children of darkness? You are the children of the 
light, you have been bought with a price, you are God's 
own. Oh, do not look back with longing eyes to the 
world! Follow the blessed Master, and in the end you 
will enter the Land of Promise, not an earthly Canaan full 
of ills, but a heavenly, where the ills of life trouble not. 

As before stated the boundary line of Goshen has not 
been fully determined. A part of the territory occupied 
by the Israelites has been settled and agreed upon, but 
the full extent of the country is not now known. Recent 
discoveries have added much to our knowledge of the 
country, but we must await further light before its full ex- 
tent can be determined. Baedeker says: "That Goshen lay 
to the east of the delta there can be no doubt, as it was 
situated between the residence of the Pharaohs and Pales- 
tine, and the Scriptures make no mention of the Nile 
having been crossed." It contained the cities of Heliop- 
olis Beth-shemesh, Zoan, Pithom, Raamses, Tahpanhes, 
all of which have been identified and fully described. The 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



391 



name of the district is still found preserved in the town 
called Kus by the Copts and Takus by the Arabians. 

We arranged for a ride over the Land of Goshen and 
a visit to the ruins of the treasure city of Pithom. The 
difficulty of getting exact information at Cairo was in our 
way and proved in the end rather annoying. We had a let- 
ter of introduction from Mr. Newberry to Dr. Grant, an 
eminent Egyptologist, but unfortunately when we called at 
his home he was absent. Dr. Watson kindly gave us what 
information he could, but we were not equipped as well in 
this respect as we should have been. 

It was very early on the morning of Jan. 28 that we 
left Cairo by rail for Zagazig, a prosperous city of some 
forty thousand inhabitants, forty-seven miles from our 
starting-point. Here we had arranged to secure donkeys 
for our ride across a portion of the Land of Goshen and the 
wilderness upon which the Israelitish host entered soon aft- 
er leaving their homes in the land of Egypt. For our jour- 
ney we had secured Achmet Ali as interpreter and 
dragoman. He was recommended as being honest and 
trustworthy. He assured us that he could take us to the 
excavations at Pithom; and we found him to be kind and 
obliging. He appeared on the scene in a flowing robe, red 
fez, white turban, baggy trousers of white material, and yel- 
low shoes, thus presenting a picturesque appearance. 
Long since we learned not to trust to appearances, and we 
again had the lesson deeply impressed before we had fin- 
ished our ride in Goshen. As it turned out our picturesque 
dragoman knew less of the locality we were seeking than 
we did ourselves. 

At Zagazig we secured good donkeys and started on 
what proved to be a long and wearisome ride. Our 
donkey-boys, or men, rather, — they were both above 



2Q2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

twenty-five years, — solemnly assured us, in the name of 
Mohammed their prophet, that we should reach the exca- 
vations in two hours and a half. This was entirely satis- 
factory, as it would give us several hours at the ruins and 
we could return to Zagazig in time to take an afternoon 
train to Cairo. Trusting to these assurances, we started 
out in good spirits in the following order: Achmet Ali 
leading the way, closely followed by the Elder and his 
donkey-boy, the writer and his driver bringing up the rear. 

It was a bright, beautiful day. The sun shone from a 
cloudless sky as warm as if it had been midsummer instead 
of midwinter. We had just been reading of the cold 
weather at home, the mercury far below zero, and we spoke 
of the contrast. We rode along the banks of the great 
canal which carries the water of the Nile to the Land of 
Goshen as it did in the days when the sons of Jacob tilled 
these same fields. We realized that we were in a goodly 
land. We passed by many prosperous villages, surrounded 
with groves of palms. The fields were covered with lux- 
uriant growing crops. Everywhere there were signs of 
the fertility of the soil and the prosperity of the people. 
We were really in Goshen, the best of all the land of 
Egypt. 

The ancient name of Egypt was Kam, which means 
blackness, and we can now see the significance of the word. 
Wherever the soil is turned up by the plowman it is as 
black as the richest prairie soil. It forms a striking con- 
trast with the green and luxuriant crops growing on every 
side. The farmer takes no pains to pulverize the soil. 
The crops grow without that labor, and the Nile mud 
levels it once each year. 

Innumerable birds are to be seen as we ride along the 
line of the canal. The pure white crane, called by the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 393 

natives aboo goordan, is the most plentiful. Standing in 
green fields their white raiment looks very pretty. In 
their hieroglyphics the ancient Egyptians used the figure 
of this bird to represent the soul, and as a result it came 




The Egyptian Ibis. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

to be regarded with sacred reverence. This feeling is still 
dominant, and the white crane is never disturbed by the 
Egyptian farmer. Then there are hawks, kites, storks, 
pigeons and the kestrel, which was also an object of vener- 
ation among the ancient Egyptians. They worshiped it 
under the name of Horus. They also held the ibis sacred 
to the name of the god Thoth, who was regarded as the 
god of time, measures and numbers. Myriads of the ibis 
were embalmed and buried in the bird catacombs, where 
they are still to be found in a good state of preservation. 
The ibis is now extinct. 

Now and then we met long caravans of camels, laden 
with heavy burdens, growling and grunting as they passed, 
uttering, as it were, a protest against everything and every- 
body. Groups of farmers were to be seen lounging under 
the shade of palm trees, or at work at the shaduf and 
sakkieh raising water from the canal to the level of their 
fields Veiled women, clad in a single blue garment, came 
down to the canal, filled their water jars, poised them 
gracefully on their heads, walked away to the village as 
easily and as gracefully as if they were not burdened with 
five gallons of water. 

Men, women and children on foot, men and boys on 
donkeys,' men on camels, we met by the score. And there 
was a great, strong, strapping fellow riding a donkey and 
carrying a child while his wife trudged along at his side, 
bearing on her head a load heavy enough for the strongest 
man to carry. It was the old, old story of woman's slavery 
and degradation, which is repeated over and over again m 
these eastern countries. 

And there we had the brickmakers at work. It was a 
scene such as might have been witnessed at this very same 
place thirty-three centuries ago when the sons of Jacob 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 395 

dwelt in the Land of Goshen. The clay was dug up with 
the same kind of hoes used in the olden time; it was car- 
ried in baskets and thrown into a round pit dug in the 
ground. Water was then poured upon it, the straw was 
thrown in and the men trod the mass until it was thorough- 
ly mixed. Then, with the hands, the clay was made into 
large balls and carried in the arms to the moulder, who, 
squatting on the ground with a crude mould before him, 
gave shape to the bricks. These were then placed in rows 
on the ground, where they were left to dry and bake in the 
hot sun. They were then ready for use and were built into 
the walls of the houses. 

We stopped some time and watched the men at their 
work. It was an interesting scene and well worth a care- 
ful study. We had seen on the ruined walls of the ancient 
City of Thebes a picture representing brickmaking, painted 
there more than three thousand years ago. And now here 
we had before us the same thing in real life. The hoes, 
the baskets, the pit, the moulder and the bricks were just 
the same. The only features wanting were the taskmasters 
and Jewish faces. Supply these, and we should have had 
in the Land of Goshen on that day, Jan. 28, 1893, an exact 
reproduction of the brickmaking of the Israelites thirty- 
three centuries ago. Singular, indeed, how the Egyptians 
cling to the old way of doing things. 

Continuing our ride, we passed by a large village 
where a weekly market was being held. By common con- 
sent of the people, one of the villages is selected and a 
market day appointed. Then the people come together 
from all the villages round about, bring their wares and 
products together, and buy and sell and trade. Fully a 
thousand men and women, boys and girls were assembled 
in the open space before the village. Long before we 



3q6 wanderings in bible lands. 

came near the place we heard the noise of many voices. 
It was a matter of surprise to us how any business could 
be transacted amid so much loud talking, yelling, confu- 
sion, but purchases were made, trades effected, and the 
people, we were told, came and went the greater part of 
the day. 

In the Land of Goshen we saw another and quite a 
simple method of raising the water from the fresh water 
canals to the level of the fields. A basket with ropes 
attached at either side is the simple machine used. Two 
men stand facing each other in the water, grasping the 
ropes in either hand. By a swinging motion the basket is 
filled with water which, by a dexterous movement of the 
ropes, is thrown into a reservoir from which it is led by 
ditches to the fields. This method is only used when it is 
not necessary to lift the water very high. It is remarkable 
how much water two men will raise by means of a basket 
and ropes in a single day. But it is hard work swinging a 
basket in this way hour after hour. The men, partially 
nude, stand in the hot sun as do the "fathers of the shaduf" 
and 'sing in a low, monotonous tone as they raise the water. 
The annexed photogravure will give an excellent idea of 
this method of irrigating the fields in the Land of Goshen. 

We crossed the large canal by a well-constructed 
bridge, then followed a smaller watercourse some distance, 
and were finally ferried across. We rode toward the line 
of the desert, which was in view in the distance, and in a 
short time we reached the border of the plain and rode out 
upon the sand of the desert. We had been so much inter- 
ested in the fertile land and the strange scenes by which 
we were surrounded that we had taken no note of the time. 
Consulting our watches we found that it was half past one, 
and that we had been in fee saddle some four hours. We 




Raising Water with a Basket. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 399 

realized at once that the promise made by Achmet and the 
donkey-boys, that we should reach the ruins in two hours 
and a half, was a bit of fruitful imagination of our Arab 
attendants. Achmet was asked to say now how much 
more time would probably pass before we should arrive at 
our destination. He held a consultation with the donkey- 
boys and said with the utmost assurance, "We go there 
very soon, in half hour." 

Our course led us farther and farther into the desert, 
and we had lost sight of the green fields of Goshen. Our 
donkeys sank to the fetlocks in the sand at every step, 
and at the end of another hour were entirely fagged out. 
We called a halt. It had become painfully evident to us 
that some one in our party had been untruthful. We 
spoke our mind pretty freely to Achmet. We had now 
been in the saddle five hours. "How about the two and 
a half hours' ride?" we asked him. He declared that the 
donkey-boys had deceived him. It was the saddest day 
of his life. He was much, very much sorry, his life was of 
but little value to him; he cared not 'for himself, but for 
us; but he could not help it, he had been basely deceived 
by those miserable donkey-boys. There was no help for 
it now. We must ride on. "We get there plenty soon 
now, very soon," he said. But we had lost confidence in 
our dragoman. He looked well enough, but his promises 
were valueless. He put the blame on the boys, but as they 
could not talk English we could not decide the merits of 
the case. One thing, however, he said which appeared 
to be true, "We must ride on." It was too late now to 
think of retracing our steps, and so we pushed ahead across 
the desert sand. 

Our donkeys had a hard time of it, and the Elder and 
the writer, taking pity on the fagged-out animals, conclud- 



/ 



400 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

ed to walk and allow them to rest. We trudged on 
through the sand under a hot sun for half an hour and 
looking back saw that the donkey-boys had mounted and 
were leisurely riding after us. But for the provokmg ele- 
ment in this incident, it would have been amusing. We 
remounted and pushed on until four o'clock. We had 
been winding about in the desert for some hours and it 
was apparent to us that neither Achmet nor the donkey- 
boys knew our whereabouts. Seeing a Beduin encamp- 
ment on a hillside not far away, we rode up to it and 
directed Achmet to call the sheik and inquire as to our 
whereabouts. The chief man of the place met us as we 
neared the tent. He had a long gun on his shoulder and 
strode out to see what the strangers wanted, war or peace. 
He was soon assured that our mission was a peaceful one, 
and he pointed out to us in the distance the mounds where 
the excavations for which we were looking had been made. 
In the distance a few palm trees were visible, and we were 
informed that these marked the site of Tel-el-Kebir 

The sun was nearing the western horizon, and as we 
had no desire to sleep on the sands of the desert we hur- 
ried on, keeping the palm trees before us. After some 
time we came to the border of a salt lake and marsh It 
was at least a mile wide and seemed to be ten miles long. 
To reach the village we must either cross the marsh or 
ride around it. We rode along the bank for a mile or 
more, and then reached a place where the ground seemed 
solid enough to bear us up. A channel had been cut 
across at this point, and the muck thrown out formed a 
low bank on the side of the ditch. The Elder ^ said, We 
must either cross here or make up our min ds to sleep on 
the desert to-night." Neither prospect was inviting, but 
the thought of prowling jackals and hyenas decided us to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 401 

try the crossing. However, if the decision had remained 
with the author the attempt to cross the marsh would not 
have been made, and the night, as we afterward found 
when we learned the length of the marsh, would have been 
spent on the desert. 

We rode in upon the soft, spongy ground of the salt 
marsh. For a short distance from the bank it seemed 
solid enough to bear up our donkeys, and we were begin- 
ning to congratulate ourselves that the crossing coulcf be 
easily made. But we had not proceeded many rods when 
Achmet's donkey sank down hopelessly, and our pictur- 
esque dragoman was floundering in the mud and water. 
Before he could turn back, the Elder was in the same plight. 
I looked upon my companions wading in the soft mud and 
dark-colored water, and congratulated myself that I had 
been wiser than they. I said to them, "I told you cross- 
ing here was not safe. I am glad I did not follow you too 
closely; you are not good leaders." But pride' goeth be- 
fore a fall. Even while these things were taking place, and 
in less time than it has taken me to write them down here, 
my own donkey moved a little to one side, sank down to 
the girth in the mud and I was keeping company with my 
unfortunate companions. We waded to the bank along 
the ditch, and found solid footing. Looking back we saw 
the three donkeys sticking fast in the mud and the men 
wringing their hands and calling on Allah to help them. 
It was well, for we could render them no assistance. 

Night was coming on and we were in the midst of a 
swamp. Setting our faces toward the farther shore, we 
pushed on. At many places the little ridge gave way and 
we were compelled to wade in the mud and water nearly 
knee-deep. After a mile of this kind of traveling we 
reached the solid ground again, and later came to an Arab 



^ 02 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

village We were told upon inquiry that Tel-el-Kebir was 
not far away. We hurried on, and at sunset reached the 
station, worn out and hungry. We had not tasted food or 
water since we ate our breakfast in Cairo in the early 
morning We ate our lunch with thankful hearts, and 
afterwards secured a cup of Arab coffee. We had ridden, 
walked and waded not less than thirty miles. Part of this 
distance was across the hot desert. It was a hard day s 
work- but we had seen what we supposed to be the ruins of 
Pithom, one of the treasure cities of Pharaoh built by the 

children of Israel. 

The donkeys and drivers reached the station later in 
the evening, presenting a sorry appearance as they came 
in Both donkeys and men were literally covered with 
mud They had a hard time lifting their animals out of 
the mud and getting them across the marsh, and they were 
"plenty tired." We pitied the poor fellows, but we also 
felt that they were blameworthy and got no more than 
they deserved. When we came to settle with them they de- 
manded double pay and extra backsheesh. It never seems 
to enter the head of a Moslem that he can be held to blame 
for any mishap that may occur, no matter how much he 
may be at fault. It was "Allah's will," and that ends the 
whole matter. We paid them a fair price for the days 
work and, adding a shilling for backsheesh, dismissed 

them. TT . „ 

As for Achmet, he was a sad man. His yellow slip- 
pers white trousers/flowing robe, and fine turban were 
mud-stained and soiled. He wore the face of sorrow large- 
ly made up for the occasion, as we have reason to believe. 
After lunch he said, "This makes me more sorry than all 
my life, I care not for myself, but you. My life I care not 
for" He then took off his turban and fez,, and bowed 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 403 

his bared head before us, saying, "You break Achmet's 
head with your cane; he care not to live." This was said 
with much feeling, but the Arab did not intend that it 
should be taken literally; it was only intended to intensify 
his expressions of regret and deep sorrow for what had 
occurred. He felt extremely bitter towards the donkey- 
boys, and of course put all the blame upon them. He de- 
clared if it were not for the law of Egypt both of them 
would be dead men, but the law restrained him. In speak- 
ing of the money paid them he said, "You pay plenty 
money, you get no good, just same as pouring water on 
sand." The force of this expression will be seen by those 
who have poured water on the hot sand of the desert. It 
disappears, . and no good results. Notwithstanding his 
apparent sorrow and his laying the blame of the failure of 
our expedition upon the donkey-boys we left him, feeling 
that he was more blameworthy than they. 

At 8 o'clock the train arrived for Cairo, and at 11:30 
we were again in our hotel. Sleep and rest are sweet to 
the weary, and how we did rest and sleep the night after 
our weary journey! It was, after all, an interesting day's 
work. It was one of those experiences in life which, when 
passed, one does not regret having had, but having had it, 
does not care to go through with it again. 




CHAPTER XXIII. 

, 

The American Mission in Egypt.-A Funeral and a Wedding- The 
Sakka-Cairo to Alexandria.-The Delta.-The Arms of the Nile. 
-The Fair at Tanta.— Alexandria.— The Seftuagint. - The In- 
troduction of Christianity. -The First Christian School.-A great 
Library and its Destruction. -The Modern City. -Catacomb s.- 
Pompeys Pillar. 

'M, » 
E are again in Cairo, and spend several days in vis- 
K . iting the American Mission Schools, the mosques of 
(sUf the c ; ty> in studying the manners and customs of 
the people and 'in writing up notes and letters. One might 
write a volume on the street scenes of the capital of Egypt 
and still leave the subject unexhausted. To the western 
traveler this oriental city is one of the most interesting in 
the world. 

Not only at Cairo, but on our journey up the Nile we 
saw much of the work of the American Mission, conducted 
by the Presbyterian church. We visited the schools at. a 
number of places and found much activity among the 
workers Dr. Watson who went to Cairo in 1861, then in 
his prime, now wears a silver crown. He said, in answer to 
a question how long he intended to stay when he came to 
Cairo " As long as the Lord lets me live." This is the 
true missionary spirit. The principal work of the mission 

is educational. , . ., . , . 

From the report for 1892 we glean the following facts 
concerning the work: During the past year, at the one 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 405 

hundred and thirty-four stations occupied, there were held 
three thousand, two hundred and eighty-seven religious 
meetings throughout the country, and an increase of four 
hundred and seventeen to the church is noted. The report 
says: 

"The number of Sabbath schools reported is one hun- 
dred and nine, attended by five thousand, four hundred and 
forty-seven pupils. Sabbath school organization is difficult 
on account of scarcity of qualified workers. The Interna- 
tional Series of lessons is used. A two page leaflet, in the 
Arabic language, explaining the lesson, is distributed week- 
ly. Over one hundred and fifty-six thousand of these little 
leaflets were sent out during the year. They do service not 
only as helps in preparing the lesson, but also to some ex- 
tent as tracts, distributed among those that do not attend 
Sabbath school. A few of the older schools bore the entire 
expense of publishing these papers the past year. These 
helps are distributed free to all schools that will use them. 

" During the year one hundred and ten schools were in 
operation, with six thousand, seven hundred and sixty- 
three pupils attending them. Of this number four thou- 
sand, six hundred and twenty-six were boys, and two 
thousand, one hundred and thirty-seven were girls. Our 
M ission Schools have educated almost all our pastors and 
teachers. The demand of the government for our pupils, 
to enter the various departments of service, has been so 
great, as even seriously to interfere with the efficiency of 
some of our higher classes. Our schools have for years en- 
joyed a high reputation in Egypt for efficiency, and our 
constant aim is to gradually raise the standard of scholar- 
ship. Under the present administration the Egyptian Gov- 
ernment schools in the larger cities have been very greatly 
improved. Nothing has been done however for primary 



406 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

schools in the villages throughout the country. Our 
schools remain alone in the work of providing education 
for the children of the peasant class." 

Dr. J. R. Alexander, who has charge of the mission 
schools at Assiut, told us that in the work of the mission 
comparatively few Mohammedans were brought into the 
church. It seems a very difficult matter to turn them from 
their faith, and those who do change often go back again. 
Their converts are largely from the Coptic church. In the 
education of the children the mission is doing an important 
work. With nearly seven thousand children in their 
schools they will be able to plant seed that will surely bear 
fruit in the years to come. 

Cairo is a city of Mohammedan mosques (places of 
worship) and some of them are really fine buildings. One 
of these, the Alabaster Mosque, the walls of which are cov- 
ered with blocks and slabs of alabaster, presents a rich ap- 
pearance, and is a fine building. 

Returning to our hotel from our visit to the mosques 
and the tombs of the khaliffs, the burial-place of the rulers 
of Egypt, we passed through the principal street, called 
"The Muski." Here we met a funeral procession. The 
coffin, carried on the shoulders of four stalwart men, was 
covered with fine cashmere shawls. The occupant must 
have been a person of note, judging from the large number 
of hired mourners that followed it and the amount of noise 
they made. The procession of carriages carrying relatives 
and friends was also quite large. Before the sound of 
mourning had died away our ears were greeted with music 
and songs of rejoicing. It was a wedding procession on 
the same street. A band of music was moving along and 
playing a lively air. A number of young men followed on 
foot singing songs. Then came a carriage completely cov- 



The Sakka. Egyptian Water Carrier. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



409 



ered with cloth of gold, in which the bride sat hid from the 
view of those who thronged the street. Her friends fol- 
lowed her in open carriages, making every demonstration 
of joy. The contrast was most striking. A wedding and a 
funeral. The song of rejoicing and the wailing of the 
mourners. So do sunlight and shadow, light and darkness, 
hope and despair, rejoicing and weeping, life and death, 
joy and sorrow crowd upon each other in this old world of 
ours. But it is not often that we see the two opposites so 
closely and so strikingly brought together as we saw them 
in Cairo. 

The most industrious class of people in Cairo, it 
seemed to us, were the sakkas or water-carriers. The sakka 
may be met on the streets of Cairo at all hours of the day 
with his well-filled goatskin slung on his back. He is car- 
rying water from the Nile to fill the empty jars of his cus- 
tomers. For his slavish labor he receives a mere pittance. 
And yet he is patient, murmuring to himself, " God will re- 
ward me." In filling his goatskin he wades into the water, 
lays the skin down, holds the neck open with one hand 
and by a skillful motion with the other fills it full of water. 
Then, slinging it on his back with a strap across his shoul- 
der, he trudges along with his load, a veritable burden- 
bearer. The photogravure which is here given shows one 
of these faithful laborers standing in the water with his 
goatskin, which has just been filled, strapped on his back 
ready to start. As it was taken from life it also gives a 
good likeness of one of the sakkas of Cairo, as well as the 
style of dress worn by this class. 

The usual route taken by travelers to Egypt is to land 
at Alexandria and then journey by rail a distance of one 
hundred and twenty-eight miles to the City of Cairo. The 
books of travel usually describe Alexandria first, then give 



4 I0 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

an account of Cairo and the pyramids. Then a trip by rail 
to Ismailia is made and a boat ride from the latter place 
to Suez is taken on the canal, and the Egyptian tour is 
completed. A tour of this kind gives one but a very limit- 
ed idea of the country. It comprises but a few hundred 
miles of travel and may be, and often is, accomplished in a 
very few days by travelers who do the country. 

Those who have followed us thus far in our wanderings 
will know that we landed at Suez and came to Cairo via 
Ismailia. We omitted visiting Alexandria until our re- 
turn from the second cataract. A very good railway is in 
operation between Cairo and Alexandria, and the journey 
may be made in about four hours. Soon after leaving 
Cairo the road enters upon the district known as the Delta 
of Egypt. The delta is triangular in form and is not a 
valley, as is the country south of Cairo, but a vast alluvial 
plain, extending to a width of from seventy to one hundred 
miles and containing not less than seven thousand square 
miles. The district is flat, without any natural elevation, 
and is remarkable for the wonderful fertility of its soil. 
At present the Nile flows through the delta in two great 
branches, emptying its surplus waters into the Mediterrane- 
an Sea at Rosetta and Damietta. Between these two 
great branches of the river of Egypt there are many 
streams and canals, all fed, however, from its waters. By 
means of these branches, streams and canals the country is 
well watered and is perhaps the richest agricultural terri- 
tory in the world. 

As has already been noted, the Nile has undergone 
great changes in its branches in the delta in modern 
times In ancient times it had seven branches, of which 
the Pelusiac, the Canopic, the Tanitic and the Mendesian 
were the principal ones. Speaking of these branches Raw- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



411 



linson says: "The Pelusiac branch which was originally a 
principal one is now almost entirely dried up, and the 
Tanitic and Mendesian branches have similarly disap- 
peared."* Manning says: "The river formerly ran through 
the delta in seven channels. Five of these are dried up, 
and only two remain, known as the Rosetta and Damietta 
branches."! And he further states that the remaining 
mouths of these branches are not natural but artificial 
channels. Thus we may see for ourselves, as we travel 
over the delta of Egypt to-day, that the words of the 
prophet have been fulfilled; the seven streams of the Nile 
have been smitten and dried up so that we may pass over 
them dry-shod. 

Soon after leaving Cairo we pass through the City of 
Tanta which has a population of sixty thousand. At this 
place three annual fairs are held, at which great numbers of 
people assemble. The principal fair is held in August and 
continues an entire week. It is said that upwards of half a 
million people congregate here during the fair week. 
They come from all the countries bordering on the Medi- 
terranean and from the Mohammedan part of Africa. 
These bring with them merchandise to sell. European 
merchants are also to be found in the throng. The fair is 
simply a place for the sale of merchandise and the 
products of the various eastern countries represented. 
The Egyptian farmers attend the place in large numbers 
and purchase cattle, farming implements, clothing and 
other articles. Upwards of a million head of cattle are sold 
at these fairs during the year. 

The place presents a lively appearance. Long proces- 
sions of camels laden with chests and bales are seen con- 



* " History of Ancient Egypt," page 29. 
f "The Land of the Pharaohs," page 22. 



4j 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

verging towards the town, accompanied by crowds of men 
and large herds of cattle. The banks of the canal are 
thronged with persons washing themselves and drawing 
water. The streets teem with the most animated traffic, 
and are filled with long rows of booths, in many of which 
the occupants are seen plying their handicrafts. Dervishes 
with disheveled hair and ragged clothes, cripples and 
idiots, who are treated with great respect, are clamorous 
for backsheesh.* 

We have been traveling over a very rich country, so 
far as the land is concerned, and if the people were not 
taxed so heavily they would be prosperous and happy; but 
they must pay about an average of six dollars a year to the 
Egyptian government for taxes. The soil here is the black 
Nile mud deposited on a bed of sand, and its fertility is 
surprising. Passing over the delta we are reminded of 
what Ebers says of the country. He too passed over it in 
the winter, if the spring-like weather here in January can 
be called winter. The fields, he says, are still wet in 
places, and straight canals are seen in every direction. All 
cereals grown in ancient times still flourish here, and the 
slender palm still rears its fruit-laden crown beside the 
less frequent sycamore, with its slender umbrageous 
foliage. The cotton plants are successfully cultivated 
where the soil is well irrigated and form extensive planta- 
tions of underwood; vineyards are rare, but they some- 
times occur in the northern part of the delta, the plants 
being trained on the trellis-work which we often see repre- 
sented in the paintings of the ancient Egyptian tombs. 
The water-wheels (sakkiehs) are turned by buffaloes and 
donkeys, and sometimes by camels or by steam; and the 
shaduf, though less common than in Upper Egypt, is occa- 

* " Lower Egypt," page 226. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



413 



sionally plied by slightly-clad men and boys. The canals 
are flanked with embankments to protect the fields from 
inundation, and the paths on these banks are enlivened 
with strings of camels, donkeys with their riders, and men, 
women and children on foot. From a distance the villages 
look like round, grey hillocks, full of openings, and around 
them rise dovecotes and palm trees. On closer examina- 
tion we distinguish the mudhuts huddled together on rising 
ground where they are safe from inundation. Many of 
these villages are surrounded by handsome groves of palm 
trees.* 

When the War of the Rebellion was in progress in the 
United States the Egyptian farmers on the delta made a 
golden harvest of their cotton crops. The price advanced 
beyond anything ever before known in the history of the 
product. This great advance so stimulated the production 
of the plant that the delta became one vast cotton field. 
With the close of the war trade again fell into its usual 
channels, the price of cotton fell and many a poor Egyp- 
tian farmer was bankrupt. 

In the delta the steam engine is used to raise water by 
the better class of farmers. The prejudice here against 
modern improvements and innovations, while it is yet 
strong, is wearing away and is not so manifest as in Upper 
Egypt. Having large plantations, they are better to do 
than their brethren in the upper country. Their homes are 
not entirely devoid of comforts, and in many respects their 
lot is not a hard one. 

We cross the Rosetta arm of the Nile at Zaiyat, where 
there is a long, well-constructed iron railway bridge, and 
follow the west bank of the stream, skirting the border line 
between the Libyan desert and the cultivated lands of the 



* Ebers, " Goshen," etc. 



414 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

delta; and then passing between the lakes Mareotis and 
Aboukir we have our first glimpse of the minarets of Alex- 
andria. 

Compared with Thebes, Memphis and Heliopolis, 
Alexandria is a modern city, and yet it was founded by 
Alexander the Great three hundred and thirty-two, years 
before the birth of Christ. After he had conquered the 
land of the Pharaohs the great general left this city bear- 
ing his name, " a magnificent and lasting memorial of his 
Egyptian campaign." Here it was that the. great general 
was buried. The harbor and the surroundings are admira- 
bly adapted for a great commercial city, and Napoleon said 
that Alexander showed more wisdom in the selection of 
the site for his capital of Egypt than he did in all his bat- 
tles and victories. The sheltered harbor is large enough to 
float all the navies of the world. 

In the days of its greatest prosperity and glory Alex- 
andria became the center of trade between the East and 
the West. It grew until its inhabitants numbered over half 
a million. It was not only the center of eastern commerce, 
but it became also the center of learning and literature. It 
was the great educational city of the East. It had at one 
time an immense library, numbering nearly half a million 
volumes, or rather rolls of manuscript. Many learned 
Jews from Jerusalem lived in the city, and it was here that 
the Old Testament was for the first time translated into the 
Greek. A letter is extant which purports to give an ac- 
count of how the translation came to be made. It says 
that one Demetrius, keeper of the Alexandrian library, 
proposed to Ptolemy II, who reigned B. C. 286-247, to 
have a Greek copy of the Old Testament made for the 
library. The king assented, and seventy-two learned Jews, 
selected with great care, were set apart for the work. The 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 41 5 

sacred roll of the law was brought to Alexandria from Je- 
rusalem, the translation was made and a copy of it was 
placed in the library. The title of the work was the Sep- 
tuagint, so called because it is said to be the work of the 
seventy-two writers. The name still clings to this ancient 
version of the Old Testament. Whether the tradition in 
regard to the LXX be true or not, it is established that this 
translation was made at Alexandria at least one hundred 
and fifty years before Christ. 

The evangelist St. Mark introduced Christianity into 
Alexandria and may have written his version of the Gospel 
at this place. The church prospered and very soon grew 
so large that it outranked both Jerusalem and Antioch in 
importance. Here the first Christian school or college was 
established, and tradition says that it was founded by St. 
Mark himself. Be this as it may, it is a fact that in A. D. 
189, when the learned bishop Clement took charge of the 
school, succeeding his master Panaenus, the institution 
was in a prosperous condition. The good bishop labored 
here for years expounding the Scriptures and meeting and 
overthrowing by argument the various heathen systems of 
philosophy and religion which were prevalent in his day. 
It was here, too, that Origen when in his eighteenth year 
was appointed to succeed Clement in the school. He gave 
himself wholly to teaching in the school and refused all 
remuneration for his services. He sold the books which he 
possessed, — many of them manuscripts which he himself 
had copied, — on condition that he should receive from the 
purchaser a sum equal to about four cents a day, and on 
this scanty pittance he lived. After teaching all day he 
spent much of the night in searching the Scripture. His 
life was wholly devoted to study and teaching.* As to the 

* " Life of Origen," Antenicene Library, Vol. II, page 25. 



416 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

date of the founding of the Christian school at Alexandria, 
it is not at all improbable that it may have been first 
opened by Mark. It would have been quite natural for him 
to gather the first converts together to instruct them more 
fully in the way of truth. If the school was not started 
by Mark, it must have been opened very soon after his 
death. It was in a flourishing condition sixty years later 
when presided over by Panaenus. 

Perhaps one of the greatest losses the world of letters 
has sustained was the destruction of the great Alexandrian 
library by the semi-barbarous Khaliff Omar, the follower 
of Mohammed. The library contained the literature of 
the world up to the date of its destruction. In it were 
books which, if we could have them, would doubtless set- 
tle many of the vexed questions of antiquity. Doubtless 
it contained the original copies of the Gospel with the 
names of the writers attached. Could these copies have 
been saved from the fire their value to-day could not be 
estimated. But when the city fell into the hands of the 
victorious Moslem the library was doomed to destruction. 
Amru, the Moslem general who captured the city, wrote 
to Omar asking as to the disposition to be made of the 
books. The reply was fatal. The khaliff wrote, " The 
contents of those books are in conformity with the Koran, 
or they are not. If they are, the Koran is sufficient with- 
out them; if they are not, they are pernicious; let them be 
destroyed." The order was obeyed, and it is said the 
books were distributed as fuel among the five thousand 
baths of the city and then they were so numerous that it 
took six months to consume them * Thus the records of 
ages were destroyed by the blind fanaticism of the 
Moslem. 

* Irving, " Life of Mohammed," page 340. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 417 

Alexandria now contains a population of two hundred 
thousand, about one-fourth of whom are Europeans. 
There are also representatives from every nation dwelling 
on the banks of the Mediterranean. The old city having 
been destroyed, the new is built after the European model, 
and were it not for the mixed character of its population 
one might well conclude that he was in a city of Europe 
instead of Egypt. 

In modern times the city has suffered much from war. 
In 1801, during the siege of the city by the English, they 
cut through the narrow bank which kept the water of the 
the sea from overflowing a large basin surrounding the 
city. As a result one hundred and fifty villages were de- 
stroyed and a vast tract of fertile land was covered by the 
sea water. The cutting was closed again and every effort 
made to repair the damage, but about one hundred thou- 
sand acres of fertile land, it is said, are still covered by the 
water. Such is the heartless destruction of war. In 1884 
the English again bombarded the City of Alexandria, de- 
stroying a large number of its houses. Traces of the de- 
struction are still to be seen, but the city has been for the 
most part rebuilt and at this time is in a prosperous 
condition. 

Near the city is an extensive series of catacombs, re- 
sembling in some respects the sleeping-places of the dead 
at Rome. The rock was literally honeycombed with subter- 
ranean passages and tomb chambers. The sides of the un- 
derground passages contain niches in which the dead were 
laid away to rest. As in Rome so also here the tomb 
chambers are frescoed, and pictures and decorations are to 
be seen. One of the former represents the Savior treading 
on and destroying serpents. There is also a representation 
of the ascension. These catacombs date from the time of 



4I g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Constantine the Great and were doubtless used by the early 
Christians. At the present time a stone quarry has been 
opened in the cemetery, and soon all traces of the Alexan- 
drian catacombs will have disappeared. 

Not far from the catacombs stands Pompey's Pillar, a 
handsome monument composed of the red granite of Assu- 
an. Including pedestal, shaft and capital, it is one hundred 
and four feet high. The shaft is sixty-seven feet high and 
nine feet in diameter at the base. It tapers slightly, and is 
eight feet at the top. It is a beautiful structure, and is the 
only ancient monument left in the city. 

The return trip to Cairo was without other interest 
than came from passing over the delta and part of the 
Land of Goshen again. The railway between the two cities 
was the first built in the East. It was completed in 1855. 




CHAPTER XXIV. 



Farewell to Cairo. -The Land of Goshen A gain. -A Dusty Ride across 
the Desert.— Suez.— The Red Sea.— An Excursion to the Wells 
of Moses.— Israel's Song of Deliverance.— The Waters of Ma- 
rah.— The Murmuring Host.— A Beautiful Oasis in the Desert.— 
The Corals of the Red Sea. 



E left the City of Cairo with its strange sights and 
interesting people on the last day of January. We 
had spent considerable time in the old oriental city, 
but were glad when the time came to continue our 
journey homeward. Our objective point was Suez, and 
we were accompanied by Mr. Gould and his lady, Ameri- 
cans whom we met at Cairo and who proved to be very 
pleasant and agreeable traveling companions. Our pur- 
pose now was to follow the Israelites, as nearly as it was 
possible for us, on their journey from the land of bondage 
toward the promised land of freedom, and especially to 
visit and examine the place where Moses led the sons of 
Jacob through the Red Sea. And this we were enabled to 
do. We crossed the Red Sea and journeyed to the waters 
of Marah, the scene of Israel's triumph over the armies of 
Pharaoh and of their murmuring against Moses on account 
of the bitter water of the desert. 

The distance from Cairo to Suez by rail is one hun- 
dred and forty-nine miles. The road runs to Ismailia, 
ninety-nine and one-half miles, and thence to Suez, along 
the great canal, a distance of forty-nine and one-half miles. 

Soon after leaving Cairo we passed by Tell-el-Yehudiyeh 
419 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

(Hill of the Jews), where Onias the high priest who lived 
one hundred and fifty years before Christ erected a temple 
to which reference has already been made. Here Brugsch 
discovered the ruins of the temple in -1871. and the ceme- 
tery near the place was discovered several years ago by 
the Egyptian Exploration Fund. It is an interesting 
locality, but we hurry on our way to the Red Sea. 

Just before reaching the Land of Goshen the road 
approaches the fresh water canal which was constructed 
by the early Pharaohs for the purpose of carrying the water 
of the Nile to the interior for drinking and irrigating pur- 
poses The canal existed fourteen hundred years before 
Christ, but fell to decay and was not used until the con- 
struction of the Suez Canal. It was then opened again to 
supply the twenty thousand workmen who labored on the 
great water way with fresh water. Before it was completed 
sixteen thousand camels were constantly employed in 
carrying water for the army of laborers. The canal is now 
used to supply Ismailia and Suez with fresh water from 
the Nile, to irrigate and fertilize the fields and gardens by 
the way and to furnish the railway engines with water. 
At the surface the canal is fifty-four feet and at the bot- 
tom twenty-six feet in width, and it has an average dep.n 
of seven feet. The volume of water passing through it is 
regulated by a system of locks. It is used for navigation 
to some extent and numerous small boats now convey the 
products of Egyptian soil to Ismailia where they ; ire ex- 
changed for imported wares, and these are brought back 
to the villages which line the banks of the canal. The 
boats use safls when the wind is favorable, but as this is 
seldom the case they are for the most part drawn by men 
Long ropes are attached to the boats and two or three 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 421 

men tug wearily along the banks, slowly drawing the 
heavily-laden boats to their destination. 

At Zagazig we enter again the Land of Goshen, the 
home of Joseph's brethren. Here several of the fresh 
water canals intersect, thus affording an abundant water 
supply, rendering the country round about famous for its 
productiveness. As the train crosses the "best of the 
land of Egypt" we are again and again impressed with the 
wonderful fertility of the soil and the beauty of the green 
fields. We think again of the time so long ago, now 
brought close to us, when the sons of Jacob dwelt here and 
were happy and prosperous. Upon these very fields, along 
this very canal, they watched their flocks and led them 
into the green pastures and by the side of still waters. 
Here their little ones, happy and contented, grew up as the 
olive branches. Then came the years of cruel oppression, 
the stirring events preceding and following the Exodus. 
While we are thinking of these things the train dashes out 
on the desert, leaving the Land of Goshen and its interest- 
ing associations behind. 

The contrast between the desert and the fertile soil 
and the rich country we have just passed through is indeed 
a striking one. The hot sun beats down on the white sand 
and the glare and the heat are terribly oppressive. The 
bed of the railway is made of sand, and as the train rushes 
on it is enveloped in a cloud of hot, stifling dust which 
fills every compartment of the partially open cars. We 
are simply enveloped in dust. We have had some dusty 
car riding at home, but a ride across the desert gives one 
an experience in this line that can be had nowhere else. 

We pass by the salt marsh and lake where, but a few 
days before, we had the rather unpleasant experience re- 
corded in a preceding chapter. We see the place we 



4 22 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

crossed by wading through the mud and water, and we 
find, too, that the marsh is at least twenty miles long. If 
we had made the attempt to ride around it, as we once 
thought of doing, instead of crossing it, as we did, a night's 
rest on the sands of the desert without shelter would have 
been added to our experiences. 

After leaving the salt marsh, the train runs through 
the sandy desert, and we reach Ismailia literally covered 
with dust. Here the blue waters of Lake Timsah, through 
which the Suez Canal passes, present a striking contrast to 
the desert through which we have just passed. Several 
large ships are passing through the canal, and their tall 
masts and smokestacks towering above the low houses 
seem strange enough. From this point to Suez we skirt 
the fresh water canal, traverse the desert again, pass by 
the Bitter Lakes where Brugsch locates the route followed 
in the Exodus, and finally, at three o'clock in the afternoon, 
we reach the town of Suez, on the shores of the Red Sea. 
We find rather pleasant quarters at the Hotel Orient, and 
here we remain several days exploring the surrounding 
country. 

After ridding ourselves of the dust of the desert, we 
walk several miles to the seashore and enjoy a view of the 
Sinaitic Peninsula, the scene of Israel's wanderings until 
they reached Sinai. We also take a general survey of 
Suez and its surroundings. The, town has a population ot 
about twelve thousand, composed of many nationalities. 
It lies at the head of the Gulf of Suez, one of the northern 
extremities of the Red Sea. It is a short distance south- 
west of the mouth of the great ship canal which unites the 
waters of the Mediterranean and Red Sea. It owes its 
importance to the traffic on this important water way. 
Before the construction of the canal, Suez was an unim- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



423 



portant Arabian village of not more than fifteen hundred 
inhabitants. The place is without attractions, and no 
traveler cares to stay longer than is necessary to visit the 
points of interest in its vicinity. 

Our first care after resting and looking about is to 
secure a competent and reliable dragoman and interpreter 
for our proposed journey to the wells or springs of Moses. 
Very much depends upon this important personage. After 
some time we arrange with Mohammed Mahmoud to take- 
charge of the expedition. He is to furnish donkeys, boats, 
attendants, food and water, and all that is needful for the 
journey. We, on our part, agree to pay him a stated sum 
of money, provided he fulfills his part of the contract in a 
satisfactory manner. 

At an early hour next morning we were up and ready 
to start. After walking a considerable distance we reached 
the water side where we found a large Arab sailboat with 
boatmen and five donkeys aboard, all ready to start for 
the other side of the Red Sea. It was a bright, beautiful 
morning, with a light breeze blowing strong enough to fill 
our sails. After coasting along the shore line for some 
distance we crossed directly over the narrow strip of water 
and ran our boat aground some forty feet from the shore. 
Here again we had the novel experience of sitting astride 
the neck and shoulders of an Arab and being carried in 
this way from the boat to the shore. We all landed with- 
out ^nishap save Mr. Gould. He was perched on the 
shoulders of an Arab, and when only a few feet from the 
boat, where the water was at least three feet deep, his 
man stumbled and fell, and our friend received a complete 
ducking. With the exception of this unpleasant incident 
all landed in safety. 



424 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

And now we have crossed the Red Sea, and in doing 
so we have passed from Africa into Asia. Looking back 
over the sea, we are reminded of the profound interest con- 
nected with this spot. As Stephan says: "This is the 
scene of Pharaoh's attempted passage, and these waves 
once bore the ships of King Hiram and King Solomon, 
which every three years brought gold from Ophir, and 
ivory ebony and incense to the harbors of Elath and 
Ezion-geber. Here, too, once plied the light Moorish 
vessels, mentioned in the Old Testament, and simdar to 
the craft now used by the Arab boatmen, and to the one 
in which we had just crossed the arm of the sea. The Red 
Sea was also navigated by the merchantmen of the 
Ptolemies and the Romans, who, by this route, imported 
precious stuffs from India, and spice from Arabia-the 
robes and pearls which decked Cleopatra, and the frankin- 
cense which perfumed the palace of the Casars on the 
Palatine Hill." The waves of this sea wash the shores of 
Sinai, the Mount of God, from which the law was given to 

Moses. . 

Here, too, on these very shores, stood the children ot 
Israel and saw their enemies overwhelmed in the sea. 
And here it was that Miriam took a timbrel in her hand 
' and sang the song of triumph, which Moore has immortal- 
ized in verse: 

Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea! 
Jehovah has triumphed,— his people are free! 
Sing —for the pride of the tyrant is broken, 
His chariots, his horsemen, all splendid and brave,- 
How vain was their boasting! the Lord hath but spoken, 
And chariots and horsemen are sunk in the wave. 
Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea! 
Jehovah hath triumphed-his people are free! 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 425 

"Praise to the Conqueror, praise to the Lord! 
His word was our arrow, his breath was our sword. 
Who shall return to tell Egypt the story 
Of those she sent forth in the hour of her pride? 
For the Lord hath looked out from his pillar of glory, 
And all her brave counsels are dashed in the tide. 
Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea! 
Jehovah has triumphed— his people are free! " 

And here, too, on the shores of the Red Sea, certainly 
not very far from the spot where we are standing to-day, 
"Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore." And 
what a sight that must have been to the sons of Jacob! 
To the fleeing slaves, who had served so many years in 
cruel bondage, the sea opened and they passed through 
on dry ground, "and the waters were a wall unto them on 
their right hand and on their left." The Egyptians, in hot 
pursuit, sure of their prey, followed in great haste. But 
as they pressed forward confusion seized upon them, and 
then suddenly the walls of water were loosed and 
Pharaoh's host was struggling and drowning in the midst 
of the sea. What a wonderful deliverance for the fugitives 
who stood on this very shore so many centuries ago! 
How they must have rejoiced as they saw their terrible 
enemies overthrown, and realized for the first time that 
they were free from the bondage of Egypt! No wonder 
Moses and all the people sang unto the Lord this glad 
song of deliverance: 

" I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously: 
The horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea. 
The Lord is my strength and song, 
And he is become my salvation: 
This is my God, and I will praise him; 
My father's God, and I will exalt him. 
The Lord is a man of war: 
The Lord is his name. 

Pharaoh's chariots and his host hath he cast into the sea; 



42 6 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

And his chosen captains are sunk in the Red Sea. 
The deeps cover them: 

They went down into the depths like a stone. 

Thy right hand, O Lord, is glorious in power, 

Thy right hand, O Lord, dasheth in pieces the enemy. 

And in the greatness of thine excellency thou overthrowest them that 

rise up against thee: 
Thou sendest forth thy wrath, it consumeth them as stubble. 
And with the blast of thy nostrils the waters were piled up, 
The floods stood upright as an heap; 
The deeps were congealed in the heart of the sea. 
The enemy said, 

I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil: 

My lust shall be satisfied upon them; 

I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them. 

Thou didst blow with thy wind, the sea covered them: 

They sank as lead in the mighty waters. 

Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? 

Who is like thee, glorious in holiness, 

Fearful in praises, doing wonders? 

Thou stretchedst out thy right hand, 

The earth swallowed them. 

Thou in thy mercy hast led the people which thou hast redeemed- 

Thou hast guided them in thy strength to thy holy habitation. 

The peoples have heard, they tremble: 

Pangs have taken hold on the inhabitants of Philistia. 

Then were the dukes of Edom amazed; 

The mighty men of Moab, trembling taketh hold upon them: 
All the inhabitants of Canaan are melted away. 
Terror and dread falleth upon them; 

By the greatness of thine arm they are as still as a stone; 

Till thy people pass over, O Lord, 

Till the people pass over which thou hast purchased. 

Thou slralt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thme 

inheritance, . 
The place, O Lerd, whieh thou hast made for thee to dwell in, 
The sanctuary, O Lord, which thy hands have established. 
The Lord shall reign for ever and ever. 

For the horses of Pharaoh went in with his chanots and I with his 
horsemen into the sea, and the Lord brought agam the waters 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 427 

of the sea upon them; but the children of Israel walked on dry 
land in the midst of the sea."* 

Mounting our donkeys we start, with Mohammed as 
our leader, on our way for the wells of Moses. Our route 
traverses the desert with the Red Sea to our right, while 
the great wilderness of the wandering stretches out to our 
left. Toward the west, a distance of some thirty miles 
from the springs of Moses, tower the Ata-Kah Mountains, 
presenting a beautiful and picturesque appearance. Next 
to the sea the wall of the mountain rises almost perpendicu- 
larly to a considerable height. Here the retreat of the Is- 
raelites may have been cut off, leaving their only means of 
escape through the Red Sea. 

We are now, beyond all doubt, following the line of 
march taken by Moses as he led the army of Israel toward 
Mount Sinai. Every step reminds us, over and over 
again, of the Bible, and we can understand it better and 
better as we follow the route of the Exodus and find that 
the conditions here, even after the lapse of more than 
three thousand years, agree so well with the statements 
made in the Book of books. Continuing our journey we 
see in the distance an oasis in the desert. The palm trees 
forming a beautiful grove are waving their branches in the 
air, and we have no need that Mohammed should tell us 
that these palms grow at the wells of Moses. We know 
that this is the only oasis in all the desert near the place 
where God opened the waters of the sea for his people to 
pass through. After our tiresome ride across the desert, 
the green oasis and the inviting shade of the palms pre- 
sent a beautiful sight, in striking contrast with the sand of 
the desert. We ride up to the largest of the wells and are 
met by the sheik of the band of Beduin Arabs who have 

*Ex. iS: 1-19, Revised Version. 



428 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

their home here. He bids us welcome and we dismount 
and are soon resting beneath the shade of the trees. We 
eat our noonday lunch in a small building erected for that 
purpose, for the use of which the sheik expects a generous 
backsheesh, and then start out to explore the place. 

Our photogravure gives a beautiful picture of the 
larger of the wells and the small building placed at our 
service by the sheik. 

Leaving my companions I find a quiet resting-place 
beneath the shade of the palm and tamarisk, and with 
note-book and Bible some time is spent in quiet medita- 
tion and thought. I read, "And when they came to 
Marah, they could not drink of the waters of Marah, for 
they were bitter: therefore the name of it was called 
Marah. And the people murmured against Moses, saying. 
What shall we drink?" Ex. 15: 23, 24. Is this the Marah 
of the Bible? Is this the scene of the murmuring of the 
host of Israel? Many Bible scholars who have made a 
careful study of the route of the Exodus think it is, and I 
am quite willing to accept their opinion without entering 
into the controversy. And so, seated near the larger of 
the wells, I write these lines. In meditation my mind goes 
back to the time when Israel encamped round about these 
waters. In my imagination I see the plains covered with 
the white tents of the sons of Jacob. I hear the people 
lifting up their voices and murmuring against the man 
who had brought them out of bondage. They are saying, 
"The waters of the Nile are sweet in the green meadows 
of the Land of Goshen. There in Egypt we had plenty 
and to spare. Why hast thou brought us hither to drink 
of these bitter waters? Oh that we were again in the 
green fields of Goshen! Oh for a draught of the sweet 
waters of the Nile!" How soon has the song of rejoicing 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 43! 

turned into the bitterness of complaint. Moses, the tried 
man of God, hears the murmurs of the people, " and he 
cried unto the Lord; and the Lord showed him a tree, 
which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were 
made sweet." 

I have just read, here at the waters of Marah, the 
fifteenth chapter of Exodus with wonderful interest. How 
real it all seems when we read of these wonderful occur- 
rences just where they took place. It is a blessed privilege 
to be permitted to wander in the Lands of the Bible and to 
visit these places made sacred by their associations. And 
here I record the gratitude of my heart to Almighty God 
for his goodness to me in all my wanderings, and especially 
for permitting me to visit this place, the scene of Israel's 
triumph and murmuring. Surely God has been very good 
to me, and here this day, at the wells of Moses, beneath 
the shade of the trees, I bow in gratitude to the dear 
Father above. 

There are at least a dozen springs or fountains at this 
place. Porter counted twelve, while Dean Stanley places 
the number at seventeen. The water in some of them is 
sweet enough for drinking purposes, while in others it is 
brackish and bitter. The largest of the fountains, lying 
on the upper side of the oasis, is surrounded by a wall 
which was built to keep the drifting sand from filling it 
up. The basin inside the wall is forty-six feet long, thirty 
feet wide at one end, and twenty-seven feet at the other. 
The water forces its way up through the soft, black mud, 
bringing with it numerous gas bubbles which burst as they 
reach the surface. Thrusting a cane or stick into the mud 
and drawing it out again, the hole thus made becomes the 
source of a new fountain. From the larger fountain the 
water flows through an opening in the wall, forming a 



432 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

beautiful little stream some two feet in width and four 
inches in depth. It then is led into the gardens, five in 
number, which it irrigates and fertilizes. Several other 
fountains which do not have outlets also supply water, 
which is used to irrigate the oasis. Around the fountains 
vegetation grows luxuriantly, and the date palm, the 
tamarisk, the acacia and the pomegranate thrive in abun- 
dance. With the care given the gardens by. the Arabs 
they are not what we should call well kept. If properly 
cultivated and cared for they might be made to bloom as 
a garden of roses in the midst of this perfectly barren 
desert. 

About one thousand paces from the largest fountain 
stands a solitary palm tree at the foot of a little hill, on 
the top of which is a fountain four feet in diameter and 
nearly two feet deep. The water is quite bitter and sick- 
ening to the taste. The bottom of the pool is covered 
with black mud, and the water which runs away in small 
streams is soon swallowed up by the desert sand. It 
seemed to us that it was almost a miracle in itself that not 
only this but all the fountains here force their way to the 
top of the ridge, some twenty or thirty feet above the level 
of the tract which is spread out between them and the sea. 

From the elevation which we occupy we have a fine 
view of the surrounding country. Only a few miles away 
are the waters of the Red Sea. This is the boundary line 
between two continents-Asia and Africa— and while we 
are on Asiatic soil we have before us part of the African 
Continent. They approach each other like giant rivals. 
As Schubert says: ''Asia and Africa seem to scowl at each 
other across the Red Sea like wrestlers who have divested 
themselves of their garments and are on the point of enter- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 433 

ing the lists to fight a fierce battle for the sovereignty of 
the world. On the African side the Ata-Kah Mountains 
present a bold and menacing appearance, while the dreary 
desert of Asia, situated among the Gebel er-Raha, bids 
defiance to its loftier adversary." At our feet lies the 
plain where Israel encamped by the waters of Marah, and 
it needs but a glance to show us that it meets all the re- 
quirements named in the Bible. It was in every respect 
a delightful camping place, with the single exception that 
the waters were bitter until they were miraculously healed 
by Moses. 

But the day is far spent and we must leave the oasis 
and recross the stretch of desert and the sea that lies be- 
tween us and Suez. Before leaving we cut some branches 
from the palms and tamarisks. The latter may have been 
the kind of tree cast into the water by Moses to heal its 
bitterness and make it sweet. Not forgetting the back- 
sheesh, for which many hands are held out, we ride away 
from Ayun Musa on our return journey. Reaching our 
boat we are carried aboard without mishap. The donkeys 
are driven into the water and, swimming to the boat, are 
lifted on board, and we set sail for the other side. 

Before landing at Suez we cross over the sea to where 
the red coral abound. A stiff breeze is blowing. Our 
sails are hoisted and our boat cuts through the water very 
rapidly. After sailing some miles we see the corals at the 
bottom, and occasionally a gleam of reflected light tinges 
the waters and gives them the color of blood. May it not 
be possible that the sea has its name from these red corals 
and the red tinge of water above them, and not from the 
reddish sand on the seashore, as some travelers have sup- 
posed? One of our boatmen divests himself of his clothing 
and diving down head first brings up from the bottom 



434 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

handfuls of the beautiful red coral, some of which we take 
with us as a memento of our sail on the Red Sea. We 
reach our hotel late in the evening, very tired after the 
fatiguing day's work; but to us it is one among the most 
interesting days spent in Egypt. 



CHAPTER XXV. 




The Route of the Exodus. — Crossing the Red Sea. — Various Opinions 
as to the Place. — The Sinaitic Peninsula. — The Beduins and their 
Customs. — The Murmuring Israelites. — The Sinaitic Mountains. — 
The Mount of Moses. — The Plain of Assemblage. — Ras Sufsafeh, 
the Pulpit of the Law. — The Convent. — Tischendorf 's Great Dis- 
covery.— A Happy Theologian. 



URING a short stay here at Suez in the neighbor- 
hood of the very spot where the Israelites crossed 
the Red Sea and where Pharaoh's army was over- 
thrown, we have time to look up the important question in 
regard to the route of the Exodus. This question has not 
been definitely settled, and has given rise to a great deal 
of controversy among Bible scholars and travelers. At 
what particular place on the shores of the Red Sea did 
the Israelites march in between the walls of water and 
thus escape from their pursuers? is the question asked, 
and up to this time it has not received an answer to satisfy 
all minds. And there is, it seems to us, good reason for 
this uncertainty. Owing to the fact that the drifting sands 
of the desert have covered up many cities, well known in 
the days of Moses, so that we do not know where they 
stood, room is left for conjecture as to the route actually 
taken. With the lapse of more than thirty centuries the 
physical conditions of the country may also have under- 
gone some change. Taking these things into considera- 
tion, it is not strange that difference of opinion obtains. 
Since the discovery of the treasure cities of Pithom and 

435 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Raamses, we have one part of the question definitely 
settled, i. e., the place from which the Israelites started on 
their long 'march which was, after forty years, to bring 
them to their promised possessions in the Land of Canaan. 

The Bible is very explicit as to the various camping 
places of the Israelites from the time they left Raamses 
until they pitched their tents by the Jordan. These camp- 
ing places were afterward written down by Moses and are 
now a part of the Bible. Some of them, as has already 
been pointed out, have been discovered and fully identified; 
others have entirely disappeared. The list given by 
Moses is in part as follows: "And Moses wrote their go- 
ings out according to their journeys by the commandment 
of the Lord: and these are their journeys according to 
their goings out. ... And the children of Israel re- 
moved from Rameses, and pitched in Succoth. And they 
departed from Succoth, and pitched in Etham, which is 
in the edge of the wilderness. And they removed from 
Etham, and turned again unto Pi-hahiroth, which is before 
Baal-zephon: and they pitched before Migdol. And they 
departed from before Pi-hahiroth, and passed through the 
midst of the sea into the wilderness, and went three days' 
journey in the wilderness of Etham, and pitched in 
Marah."* We were enabled in our wanderings to follow 
the Israelites as far as the supposed waters of Marah; if not 
upon their line of march, not far from it. 

According to the Bible account given above, the first 
day's march brought them to Succoth, a place which has 
been clearly identified as the district surrounding Pithom. 
And here was their first stopping place. Their next move- 
ment brought them to Etham "in the edge of the wil- 
derness." The course they were now taking would have 

*Num, 33:2-8. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 437 

led them around the head of the gulf over the caravan 
route to Sinai and Canaan. But here their course was 
suddenly changed and they turned about by the command 
of the Lord. "Speak unto the children of Israel, that 
they turn and encamp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol 
and the sea, over against Baal-zephon: before it shall ye 
encamp by the sea."* It was this retrograde movement, 
directly out of their apparent course which led Pharaoh to 
say, "They are entangled in the land, the wilderness hath 
shut them in," and induced him to pursue them in the 
hope of forcing them to return and serve him. While they 
were encamped here by the sea, resting from their march, 
"the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and, behold, 
the Egyptians marched after them; and they were sore 
afraid." Then came in swift succession the miraculous 
passage through the sea and the overthrow and destruc- 
tion of the Egyptian army. 

As to the part of the sea where the passage took place 
there are three different views held by those who have 
given the subject any considerable attention. 

I. This view locates the passage several miles south 
of Suez, between the mountain of Ata-Kah and the oppo- 
site shore of the Red Sea. The width of the sea at this 
point is, according to Porter, seven miles. Robinson's 
measurement makes it somewhat wider, but these differ- 
ences may arise from the different stages of the tide when 
they were made. This view, as Schaff says, seems to 
accord best with the literal meaning of the narrative, that 
the waters were divided and stood up like a wall or like 
entrenchments on both sides of the passing army. But it 
is impossible that six hundred thousand armed men, with 
women and children and their herds of cattle, could have 

*Ex. 14:2. 



^jg ' WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

crossed such a distance in one night without a prodigious 
accumulation of miracles. And would the Egyptians have 
dared to follow the Israelites through the deep sea, in 
view of such an amazing and overpowering interposition 
of God? Could the east wind, or any other wind, have 
such an effect on the sea so wide as it is here? And if not, 
why is it mentioned at all? 

2 The second theory, which has been adopted by a 
large number of Bible scholars, locates the passage nearer 
the head of the Gulf of Suez, some distance north, of the 
town of that name. The gulf has the shape of a horn, and 
is a shallow channel less than a mile wide and about four 
miles long, running from the north to the south. In it are 
several small islands and sand banks, bare when the water 
is low. As a reedy marsh it may have extended considera- 
bly farther north, perhaps as far as the Bitter Lakes. 

The crossing took place during the time of an extraor- 
dinary ebb, which was hastened and extended by a continu- 
ous night storm blowing from the northeast against the 
water and laying bare the whole ford for the passage of the 
Israelites; after which the sea, in its reflux, returned with 
double the usual power of the flood tide and overwhelmed 
Pharaoh's army. In ordinary times many a caravan 
crossed the ford at the head of the gnlf at low ebb before 
the Suez Canal was built. Napoleon, deceived by the tidal 
wave, attempted to cross it on returning from Aynn Musa 
in 1799 and nearly met the fate of Pharaoh. But an army 
of six hundred thousand could, of course, never have 
crossed it without a miracle. The question is only whether 
the miracle was immediate or mediate; in other words, 
whether God suspended the laws of nature, or whether he 
used them as agencies both for the salvation of his people 
and for the overthrow of his enemies. The express men- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS, 439 

tion of the strong east wind which Jehovah caused to blow 
all night decidedly favors the latter view, which is also sup- 
ported by an examination of the spot. The tide at Suez is 
very strong and rapid, especially under the action of the 
northeast wind. This wind prevails there and acts power- 
fully on the ebb tide, driving out the waters from the small 
arm of the sea which runs up by Suez, while the more 
northern part of the arm would still remain covered with 
water, so that the waters on both sides served as walls of 
defense or intrenchments to the passing army of Israel. In 
no other part of the gulf would the east wind have the ef- 
fect of driving out the water. 

Dr. Robinson calls the miracle a miraculous adaptation 
of the laws of nature to produce a required result.* It was 
wrought by natural means supernaturally applied, f The 
same view is also adopted by other modern scholars. It 
does not diminish the miracle, but only adapts it to the lo- 
cality and natural agency which is expressly mentioned by 
the Bible narrative. 

This theory is strongly supported by Dr. Robinson. 
He says that the strong east wind was a miraculous agency 
in the hands of the Lord, used in connection with the ebb 
of the tide to divide the waters. It will be observed, by 
the examination of a map, that the northeast wind acting 
with the tide would have the effect of driving out the wa- 
ters from the small arm of the sea which runs up by Suez. 
Thus the waters would be divided and be a wall or defense 
to the Israelites on the right hand and on the left. To the 
objection that at this place there could not be space and 
depth of water enough to cause the destruction of the 
Egyptians, as related in the Bible, it is urged that this arm 

* Robinson's " Researches," Vol. I, page 82. 
f SchafT, "Through Bible Lands," page 158. 



440 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

of the sea was both wider and deeper; and also that the 
sea in its reflux would not only return with the usual power 
of the flood tide, but with a far greater force and depth, in 
consequence of having been driven over by the wind. It 
would seem, moreover, to be implied in the triumphal song 
of Moses on this occasion that on the return of the sea the 
wind was also changed, and acted to drive the flood in 
upon the Egyptians * 

3. The view set forth by Brugsch, in which he places 
the Exodus north of the Red Sea by the usual caravan 
route, created a great deal of comment when it was first 
published; but recent discoveries show that his conclusions 
are not correct. As his theory seeks to do away with the 
miracle, and hence is not in accord with the Bible state- 
ment, we may dismiss it without further comment. 

These are some of the theories held in regard to the 
place where the crossing of the Israelites occurred and 
where the army of Pharaoh was overwhelmed and de- 
stroyed in the sea. The Bible account is plain, and if the 
sites of the cities named by Moses as camping places can 
be found, all controversy as to the place of crossing will be 
at an end. Until such discoveries are made we may not 
expect perfect agreement among Bible scholars. 

It seemed to us, in examining the scenes of the Ex- 
odus with the Bible as our guidebook, that some of the 
conditions there given have been overlooked by Drs. Rob- 
inson, Schaff and McGarvey. Let us notice what the Bible 
says about the place of the Exodus. 

I. - Speak unto the children of Israel, that they turn 
and encamp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the 
sea, over against Baal-zephon: before it shall ye encamp." 
Ex. 14: 2. It is plain from this that the Israelites turned 

* Robinson's " Researches," Vol. I, page 83. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 441 

away from the caravan route and pitched their camp by the 
sea. If the sites of Baal-zephon and Migdol were known 
the matter would be settled; but as yet they have not been 
discovered. 

2. "For Pharaoh will say of the children of Israel, 
They are entangled in the land, the wilderness hath shut 
them in." The conditions of their camping place before 
Baal-zephon were such as to lead Pharaoh to conclude that 
they were hemmed in by the wilderness and sea, ''entan- 
gled in the land," and he was encouraged to follow them. 

3. " But the Egyptians pursued after them, .... 
and overtook them encamping by the sea, .... the 
children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and, behold, the 
Egyptians marched after them; and they were sore afraid." 
Ex. 14: 9, 10. It would seem that the Israelites were so sit- 
uated, when they saw the Egyptians in close pursuit, that 
the only way of escape was to go through the sea, and such 
indeed was the Lord's purpose in bringing them to the 
seaside. The first two authors named do not refer to this 
condition. 

4. " And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; 
and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east 
wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the wa- 
ters were divided. And the children of Israel went into 
the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters 
were a wall to them on their right hand, and on their left." 
Ex. 14: 21, 22. It will be seen here that the Lord used the 
strong east wind for the accomplishment of his purpose, 
that the waters were divided, and that on either side of the 
Israelites they stood as walls of defense. The only way 
open for pursuit was to follow the fugitives through the 
sea. Dr. McGarvey omits entirely the agency of the east 



44 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

wind in the accomplishment of the Lord's purpose. It was 
used; for it is so stated. 

5 "And the waters returned, and covered the chari- 
ots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that 
came into the sea after them; there remained not so much 
as one of them." Ex. 14: 28. The distance across the sea 
where it was divided and the depth of the water must have 
been sufficient to allow all the army of Pharaoh to be with- 
in it at one time; and when the waters returned they were 
deep enough to cover the chariots and horsemen, so that 
not one of them escaped. It will be seen that both the 
first and second theories named contain nearly all the Bi- 
ble requirements. The difference between them is one of 
opinion rather than fact. We can very easily afford to wait 
until further discoveries are made by the Egyptian Explo- 
ration Society. Of one thing we may rest assured, when 
the route of the Exodus is fully explored it will be found 
to agree exactly with the Bible account. 

An author, who is by no means partial to the Bible, 
writing on the Exodus, says that until recently the Bible 
was the only source of information regarding the emigra- 
tion of the Jews from Egypt, but the monuments and papy- 
rus scrolls which have been handed down to us by the 
ancient Egyptians, and deciphered by modern ingenuity, 
now convey to us a distinct idea of the condition of Egypt 
at the time of the Exodus, which we may compare with 
contemporaneous Biblical accounts. On comparing the 
Bible narrative with the monuments, we find that they agree 
on all material points * 

After the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea and their 
wonderful deliverance by the hand of the Lord from the 
host of Pharaoh, the children of Israel found themselves on 

* Baedeker, " Lower Egypt," page 481. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 443 

the border of the great wilderness, known as the Sinaitic 
wilderness. They had left the land of plenty, and were 
now to enter upon the peculiar hardships of a desert life. 
It was our intention to follow them in their wanderings to 
Mount Sinai, but wq failed to secure a company, and the 
Elder did not feel like taking a camel ride that would have 
extended over twenty-five days on the desert. We satisfied 
ourselves with a journey to the wells of Moses, and a sight 
of the mountains of Sinai through our field glass. We, 
however, give a short account of the wilderness, abridged 
from the works of Palmer, Schaff and Baedeker. 

The peninsula is formed by two arms of the Red Sea 
extending northeast and northwest into Arabia Petraea. 
That in the west is known as the Gulf of Suez, while the 
eastern arm is called the Gulf of Akabah. The former is 
one hundred and ninety miles in length, and the latter one 
hundred and thirty. It will be noticed by this description 
that the Sinaitic Peninsula is in the form of a triangle, the 
base line of which is one hundred and fifty miles and the 
two sides as given above. It contains eleven thousand 
square miles, and within the boundary of this territory oc- 
curred many of the events, recorded in the Bible, of the 
forty years' wandering of the children of Israel. The 
Arabs call it el Tih (the wandering). 

It consists of broad, undulating plains, narrow valleys, 
dry river beds, isolated mountains, and precipitous rocks of 
limestone and granite, with fantastic shapes and gorgeous 
colorings. It is rich in mineral wealth of iron, copper and 
turquoise, so that the Egyptians called it the " Mafkat," 
that is, Land of Copper or Turquoise. The mines are now 
neglected, but were once worked on a large scale by the 
ancient Egyptians, especially in the neighborhood of Sev- 
bet el Khadim, where hieroglyphic tablets still record the 



444 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



names and titles of kings * The Bible contains the follow- 
ing allusion to these mines: 

" Yes, truly, for the silver there's a vein, 
A place for gold which they refine. 
The iron from the dust is brought, 
And copper from the molten ore. 
To (nature's) darkness man is setting bounds; 
Unto the end he searcheth everything— 
The stones of darkness and the shade of death. 
Breaks from the settler's view the deep ravine; 
And there, forgotten of the foot-worn path, 
They lay them down,— from men they roam afar. 
Earth's surface (they explore) whence comes £orth bread, 
Its lowest depths, where it seemed turned to fire 
Its stones the place of sapphire gems, 
Where lie the globes of gold. 
A path the bird of prey hath never known, 
Nor on it glanced the vulture's piercing sight, 
Where the wild beast hath never trod, 
Nor the roaring jackal ever passed it by. 
Against the granite sends he forth his hand; 
He overturns the mountains from their base. 
He cutteth channels in the rocks; 
His eye beholdeth every precious thing. 
From weeping bindeth he the streams, 
The deeply hidden brings he forth to light"! 

The general appearance of the wilderness is that of a 
barren, desolate, dreary land. Sand, hard gravel and rock 
cover all the vast plain which is broken here and there by 
oases; mountain ranges and romantic valleys abound, cov- 
ered to some extent with scrubby shrubbery on which the 
camels of the traveler feed. The tent of the wandering 
Arab is sometimes seen, but there is not' a habitable house 
in all the peninsula, except the Greek Convent at Mount 
Sinai. It is a vast desert, and as we rode over part of it we 
did not wonder that, while the Israelites were wandering 



* " Through Bible Lands," page 145. 

t Job 28: i-ii. Translation by Lewis Lange's Commentary, page 116, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



445 



across its sands in the burning sun, their minds went back 
to the Land of Goshen and the waters of the Nile. 

Doubtless when the Israelites wandered here the pen- 
insula contained a considerable population. There were 
large colonies of Egyptian miners, and no doubt a bet- 
ter supply of water, but still not enough to supply the 
demand of the wandering sons of Jacob. God furnished 
them both food and water, and one may see that this was 
absolutely necessary, for the great host could never have 
marched across this great desert without being miraculous- 
ly led and supplied. 

At the present time there are some four thousand wan- 
dering Arabs (Beduins) on the peninsula. They manage to 
obtain a scanty livelihood on the oases and in the valleys. 
They are slight in figure and have regular, sharply-marked 
features. The boys who follow the camels and wait upon 
travelers are particularly graceful and engaging; the men 
are employed in conveying charcoal, millstones and other 
wares to Egypt. They also supply travelers (who are 
chiefly pilgrims of the Greek faith) with camels, hunt the 
wild goat, and attend to their flocks. The boys and girls, 
and sometimes the men, drive the goats and speckled 
sheep to the meager pasture in the summer, while the 
women remain in their black tents to look after the young- 
er children and attend to home duties. Seeing the spec- 
kled sheep reminds one of the artifice resorted to by Jacob 
to increase his share in his uncle's flock.* 

In the best watered parts of the peninsula, the Beduins 
dwell more permanently and cultivate plantations of the 
date palm. In the western part of the wilderness the Bed- 
uins are good-natured, honest, and generally of noble bear- 
ing; they are quite free from the sordid cupidity of the 

*Gen. 30: 37-43. 
I 



44 5 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

lower classes in Egypt, and the cry for backsheesh is not 
often heard among them. They do not practice polygamy, 
and their families are generally small. The young Bedums 
have opportunities of seeing the girls of their tribes un- 
veiled, while tending their herds on the mountains, and of 
forming attachments for them. Marriages from inclination 
are therefore frequent here, but custom requires that the 
bridegroom should purchase the bride from her father, the 
usual price being several camels and a certain sum of mon- 
ey; but the bargain is seldom concluded without protracted 
negotiations, conducted by a third party. The girl is not 
permitted to know anything of these negotiations between 
the father, the suitor, and the matchmaker, or friend of the 
bridegroom; and if she should happen to have been a wit- 
ness of them, decorum requires that she should retire into 
the mountains, though only for a few hours. Some tribes 
require that she should remain among the mountains for 
three days preceding the marriage; but among others she 
spends them in a tent erected by the side of that of her 
father, whence she is removed to the dwelling of her future 
husband. It sometimes happens that the girl flees of her 
own accord to the mountains, and seriously resists and 
throws stones at an unacceptable suitor. 

Each tribe has a sheik, or chief, a title of honor which 
is sometimes given to the oldest and most respected mem- 
bers of the tribe. The dress of these people is very simple 
and scanty. They wear a tarbush (fez) or a turban on the 
head, and a gray gown fastened about the waist with a 
girdle In cold weather they wear a heavy, coarse outer 
garment; many of them are barefoot, but the wealthier 
wear sandals made of camel's skin. Their usual weapons 
consist of sabres and knives; the guns they use for hunting 
are of great length and poorly made. They are not very 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 447 

accurate marksmen. They use neither horses nor lances, 
the camel being their beast of burden. Each tribe has its 
own particular district, the boundaries of which are dis- 
tinctly marked at doubtful points. They hold the Moham- 
medan faith, but know very little of the doctrine of the 
false prophet. They are seldom seen to pray, but they cel- 
ebrate festivals in honor of their national saints, at which 
victims are sacrificed.* 

Such are the people who now dwell in the wilderness 
where the Israelites wandered so many, many years. 

After leaving their camping place at the wells of 
Moses, which we described in a preceding letter, Moses led 
the hosts along the gravelly plain between the mountain 
and the sea into the wilderness. They camped at Elim, 
where were twelve w T ells of water and three score and ten 
palm trees. Of this route Palmer says: " From the wells 
of Moses we traversed an unwearied desert plain for three 
days: there is nothing to attract attention but the bleached 
camel-bones that mark the track A little far- 
ther on the eye is again refreshed by the sight of green 
tamarisks and feathery palms, and just off the beaten track 
is a pleasant stream of water." Other travelers did not 
find a running stream. Dr. Robinson found water by dig- 
ging shallow wells. From this it would seem that at times, 
the water comes to the surface and forms a stream, while at 
others it sinks into the land. So it must have been when 
the Israelites reached Elim, for twelve wells had to be dug 
to reach water. There are a number of palm trees growing 
at Elim. Dr. Ridgeway counted forty-seven. 

We next hear of the wanderers camping by the sea,f 
but the next move recorded in Exodus reads as follows: 

* Baedeker, " Lower Egypt," pages 478, 479. 
t Num. 33: 10. 



44 g WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

« And they took their journey from Elim, and all the con- 
gregation of the children of Israel came nnto the wilder- 
ness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai." Ex. i6: r. 
It was here in this wilderness that the people "murmured 
against Moses and Aaron." It was here that their minds 
went back to Egypt, and they said, "Would to God we had 
died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when 
we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the 
full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to 
kill this whole assembly with hunger." Ex. 16: 3. We are 
sometimes disposed to wonder that the Israelites were so 
easily discouraged. Why should they so soon forget the 
wonders wrought in Egypt and the Red Sea? But the ac- 
count is in full accord with human nature. It would have 
been surprising if they had not murmured. Here they 
were, a great host, six hundred thousand men of war with 
their wives and little ones in this great wilderness, a sandy 
desert stretching out on all sides of them. They felt the 
pangs of hunger, their little ones were doubtless crying for 
bread, and starvation was apparently staring them in the 
face How natural it was, then, for them to think of the 
"flesh pots of Egypt" and wish themselves back again in 
the green fields of Goshen! In the presence of a great 
necessity for food they forgot what the Lord had done for 
them They forgot, too, the oppression and slavery 
thought only of the best part of their living in Egypt, and 
so fell to murmuring. And how similar are professing 
Christians to-day? How often do we forget what the Lord 
has done for us and murmur and complain at our lot in life, 
and that, too, without as much cause as was apparent to 
the Israelites! It will be noticed that the Lord did not es- 
pecially rebuke the people at this time for their discontent 
and murmurings. Here it was, while traversing this plain, 



■1. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 449 

that he gave them the bread of heaven to eat and sent 
them the first flight of quails. 

The Israelites now marched to Rephidim, where the 
rock was smitten and a plentiful supply of fresh, pure wa- 
ter gushed out to supply the thirsty host. It was here, too, 
that Amalek fought against Israel, and Aaron and ' Hur 
held up the hands of their leader until the going down of 
the sun, and Amalek was discomfited and his people fell 
before Joshua, the youthful commander of the Israelites 
who was afterward to become their leader and one of their 
greatest generals. Leaving Rephidim, they came to Sinai, 
"and there Israel camped before the mount." They had 
traversed the desert and were at the end of the first stage 
of their journey. The distance traveled was a little less 
than three hundred miles. At the present time it takes 
twelve days' steady camel riding to cover the distance be- 
tween Suez and Mount Sinai. The Israelites spent two 
months in making the journey. 

On the peninsula, upon which the children of Israel 
wandered so many weary years, there are three groups or 
ranges of mountains. In the northwest is a group of which 
Mount Serbal is the highest peak; in the southeast is the 
group about the peak of Urum Schomer, and in the east is 
a central cluster in which Mount Catharine towers above 
all the rest. In this group is Mount Sinai, one of the most 
remarkable mountains, not only in the whole peninsula but 
in the world. It rises to a height of seven thousand, three 
hundred and three feet above the sea level, and is high 
enough to present an imposing appearance from the plain 
below. The range is known as the Sinaitic Mountains, tak- 
ing its name from its most noted peak. 

We are now in one of the noted and interesting locali- 
ties of the world. It was from - the throne of the mount 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 45 1 

of God " that Jehovah spoke to Moses and promulgated the 
wisest and purest code of laws ever given to man. The 
Tea Commandments are in themselves a miracle, they es- 
tablish the divine call of Moses and place him far above all 
ancient and modern lawgivers. The law proclaimed amid 
the clouds, the thunderings, and the lightnings of Sinai has 
found its way into the codes of all the civilized and en- 
lightened nations of the earth. That law, given more than 
three thousand years ago, still holds an important place 
and wields a wonderful influence in the world to-day. No 
wonder the mountain is a noted one, and that it has been 
said that Mount Sinai looks like " a huge altar " of incense. 
There it stands in solemn silence and solitary grandeur, sur- 
rounded by death and desolation, and reflects the terrible 
majesty and holiness of God. In ascending Jebel Musa* 
and Ras Sufsafeh,f where Moses communed with the Infi- 
nite Jehovah as no other mortal ever did, I was over- 
whelmed with this idea. Such a sight of terrific grandeur 
and awful majesty I never saw before, nor expect to see 
again in this wo rid. J 

It was also here that God spoke to Moses from the 
midst of the burning bush and made known to him his pur- 
pose concerning Israel, and that he, the shepherd and the 
great scholar, had been selected to lead the people out of 
the Egyptian bondage. And from this place the future 
leader and lawgiver set out on his great mission, which was 
to terminate so successfully. It was here, after the Israel- 
ites had been delivered by the hand of the Lord through 
his servant Moses, that the people, having been corrupted 
by their long intercourse with an idolatrous nation, lapsed 

* Mount of Moses. 

t A peak adjoining Mount of Moses. 

t "Through Bible Lands," page 172. 



452 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

into the same sin. And how natural it was for them that 
in their idol worship they should select the Egyptian god 
Apis, and have Aaron make for them a golden calf! They 
had seen the worship of the calf at Memphis and Heliopo- 
lis, and they now selected it. It was to this mountain that 
the prophet Elijah fled from the threats of Jezebel after the 
slaughter of the priests on Mount Carmel, and it is to be 
noted that after the giving of the law the Old Testament 
refers but once to Mount Sinai, and that one time is in con- 
nection with the prophet's flight. 

The mountain consists of two peaks, Jebel Musa, or 
"Mount of Moses," and Ras Sufsafeh, or "Peak of the 
Willow." Schaff says, " The former is the traditional, the 
latter, as I take it, is the real spot of the giving of the law; 
but both together must be included in the ' Mount of God,' 
and scene of the giving of the law." "And it came to 
pass on the third day in the morning, that there were thun- 
ders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and 
the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; so that all the 
people that was in the camp trembled. And Moses 
brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with 
God; and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And 
mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord 
descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended 
as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked 
greatly." Ex. 19: 16-18. 

Like many other localities mentioned in the Bible, 
Mount Sinai, or rather the place from which the law was 
proclaimed, has been the subject of considerable controver- 
sy. This grew out of the fact that the Justinian monks, 
when they first went to Sinai, without investigation decided 
that Jebel Musa was the place, and hence gave it the name 
of the Mount of Moses. This tradition was generally ac- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 453 

cepted until travelers began to examine the surroundings 
carefully, and it was found that this peak did not meet the 
Scriptural requirements, but that in its sister peak, Ras 
Sufsafeh, all the conditions were found. The Bible condi- 
tions as to the mountain from which the law was given are 
as follows: 

1. There must have been a great plain at the foot of 
the mountain where the people could assemble to hear the 
law, from which they could see the cloud, the smoke and 
the lightnings. Ex. 19: 16. 

2. They must have been near enough so that they 
could hear the voice of the trumpet, which caused all the 
people to tremble when they heard it. 

3. The plain must have come up to the foot of the 
mountain, for the Lord commanded Moses to " set bounds 
unto the people," so that they should not go " up into the 
mount, or touch the border of it." 

These conditions are exactly met in the peak of Sinai 
known as Ras Sufsafeh. At the foot of the mountain is the 
great plain, er-Rahah, which contains two million square 
yards, and is so large that the whole camp of Israel could 
find room upon it. Dean Stanley, Schaff, Robinson and 
others clearly identify this as the point from which the law 
was given. 

Robinson says: "While the monks were engaged in 
lighting tapers and burning incense, we determined to scale 
the almost inaccessible peak of Sufsafeh before us, in order 
to look out upon the plain, and judge for ourselves as to 
the adaptedness of this part of the Mount, to the circum- 
stances of the Scriptural history. The cliff rises some five 
hundred feet above the basin; and the distance to the sum- 
mit is more than half a mile. We first attempted to climb 
the side in a direct course, but found the rock so smooth 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and precipitous that after some falls and more exposures, 
we were obliged to give it up, and clamber upwards along 
a steep ravine by a more northern and circuitous course. 

"The extreme difficulty and even danger of the ascent 
was well rewarded by the prospect that now opened before 
us The whole plain er-Rahah lay spread out beneath our 
feet with the adjacent wadys and mountains. Our convic- 
tion was strengthened that here, or on some of the adjacent 
cliffs, was the spot where the Lord ' descended ,n fire, and 
proclaimed the law; here lay the plain where the who e 
congregation might be assembled; here was the mount that 
might be approached and touched, if not forbidden; and 
he" the mountain brow, where alone the lightnings and 
the thick cloud could be seen, and the thunders of the 
voice of the trump be heard when the Lord ■ came down in 
the sight of all the people on mount Sinai.' We gave our- 
selves up to the impressions of the awful scene, and read, 
with a feeling that will never be forgotten, the sublime ^ac 
count of the transaction, and the commandmen s theie 
promulgated in the original words as recorded by the great 
Hebrew legislator." Ex. 19: 9-25! 20; l ~ 2U . f . 

Dean Itanley says of the same place, " I am sure if he 
monks of Justinian had fixed the traditional scene on the 
Ras Sufsafeh, no one would, for an instant, have doubted 
that this could be the only spot." - 

Schaff, in referring to this matter, says, I fully satis 
fied my mind that Ras Sufsafeh is the platform from which 
the law was proclaimed. Here all the conditions required 
by the Scripture narrative are combined. 
X "A calculation made by Captain Palmer, from actual 
measurements taken on the spot, proves that the space ex- 
truding from the base of the mountain to the watershed or 

*" Biblical Researches," pages i$7> i$8- 



456 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. « 

crest of the plain, is large enough to have accommodated 
the entire host of the Israelites, estimated at two million 
souls, with an allowance of about one square yard for each 
individual."* Bartlett, after surveying the district careful- 
ly, was forced to the conclusion that this was the great pul- 
pit from which the law was given, and did not hesitate a 
single moment to add his vote " to that of Robinson, Stan- 
ley, Palmer, Holland, and the whole Ordinance Survey." 

It is interesting to know that there is a locality at 
Mount Sinai that meets all the Scriptural requirements, and 
that all questions as to the place are settled beyond any 

reasonable doubt. 

Dr. Bartlett gives the following account of his ap- 
proach and visit to Mount Sinai: " Meanwhile we were 
toiling up the rough and rocky pass of a huge mountain 
gorge, flanked by somber, weather-beaten cliffs of dark red, 
occasionally seamed with colors, and near a thousand feet 
high. The pass, though much longer, was scarcely more 
difficult than parts of that the day before from Hebron to 
Solaf. Our sheik pressed us repeatedly to dismount, ap- 
parently under the pretext of insecurity, but we declined. 
We wished to test the security of the pass. One of our 
camels. lay down twice with his rider, and required vigor- 
ous measures, and uttered a deal of growling, before he 
would get up and go on. We did not wonder that the 
loaded portion of the camels was sent around seven hours 
farther. The encumbered portion of the Israelites could 
hardly have climbed this pass, although their leader might. 
In two places I observed Sinaitic inscriptions. When we 
halted to lunch, at the top of the steepest part of the pass, 
and close by the source of the little brook, we turned over 

* " Desert of the Exodus," Vol. I, page 117. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 457 

a stone and found a scorpion of goodly size, but now mo- 
tionless and cold. 

" From this place the ascent was much more gradual, 
though constant, till in another half hour Jebel Musa (the 
Mount of Moses) came in sight at some distance to our 
left. After eighteen minutes more of ups and downs, we 
reached a stream rushing vigorously down into Wady 
T'lah. We soon crossed one source of it, which issued 
from a palm tree on our left, and we saw another source 
running down from the rocks on our right. We still con- 
tinued ascending a wide, smooth slope, till, three-quarters 
of an hour more, we stood on the watershed and looked 
down the long, broad plain of er-Rahah (the Plain of As- 
sembly), upon the mountain rising sharply at the other 
end,— the 'mountain that could be touched.' The first 
thought 

was, What an admirable place for a great encamp- 
ment; and in this respect what a contrast to any place in 
the immediate neighborhood of Serbal! High up, on a 
distant peak to our right, could be seen the residence 
formerly built by Abbas Pasha; before us, on the left of the 
Mount of Moses, was the Convent of St. Catharine; and on 
the right of the mountain, the gardens of the former con- 
vents of St. Mary, St. Peter and St. Paul. The surface of 
the valley was smooth; and, with the exception of scanty 
desert herbs, now entirely bare, although at a different sea- 
son, Mr. Holland writes ' that he has seen it a vast preen 

o ' 

with blades of grass springing up in every direction over 
it.' 

" In the clear desert air the mountain seemed close at 
hand; but it took half an hour from the watershed to reach 
the foot of Ras Sufsafeh, its northern peak, and ten min- 
utes more to enter Wady ed Deir (the 4 Valley of the Con- 
vent'), where we passed the 'Hill of Aaron' on the left, 



458 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

We observed that the convent gardens were badly washed, 
and a considerable part of them well-nigh ruined by tor- 
rents that had descended from the mountain, prostrated the 
walls, and swept away the trees. We passed a little stream 
now running down the valley, and in a few minutes drew up 
at the convent walls, having ascended twenty-three hun- 
dred feet from our encampment. Two or three of the 
monks stood on a flat roof or terrace of the convent, 
watching our approach, and with scarcely a minutes delay 
we entered through the little iron gate over the remnant of 
a snowdrift, wound our way through a series of narrow pas- 
sages, into a small, open court, then mounted a rude, 
wooden stairway to the steward's room. Here we were 
ceremoniously received and refreshed with some kind of 
conserve in small quantities, araki (which we did not care 
to drink), and more execrable French than often falls to 
the lot of man to hear. As our tents had not arrived, we 
were to spend the night here, and were shown to very com- 
fortable rooms of fair size, provided with divans and cush- 
ions around the sides, a bed in one corner, a table, and a 
rude washstand. We afterward found good reason to sup- 
pose that these rooms had more occupants than first ap- 
peared to the eye. 

"From the door of our room, which opened out of a 
long gallery, we overlooked the irregular pile of buildings 
which forms the interior part of the convent, among which 
are a church and a mosque in fraternal proximity. The 
Greek church dates back as far as the time of Justinian, but 
claims Helena as the builder of one tower. The mosque is 
declared to have been a precautionary device, which saved 
the convent at a time when the Saracens made a general 
destruction of such establishments. The enclosing walls of 
the convent, forty or fifty feet high, were begun by Justin- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 459 

ian when the empire was losing its hold on the East, and 
completed by Napoleon's general, Kleber. But the monas- 
tery was founded far earlier than Justinian. In the fourth 
century the region of Sinai was full of hermits; Eusebius 
refers to them early in the third century; and it is probable 
that the Egyptian and Syrian persecutions of the second 
century compelled them to find here a refuge. The place 
has venerable associations."* 

The persecuted Christians fled to this mountain as 
Elijah fled from the threatenings of Jezebel, and carried 
with them many of their sacred books; this accounts for 
the fact that a number of exceedingly interesting manu- 
scripts have been found in the convent. But none of these 
exceed in interest the copy of the New Testament by 
Tischendorf. It is a remarkable coincidence that on the 
same mountain where the law was given to Moses was pre- 
served the most perfect manuscript copy of the Gospel 
now known to exist. 

It was on May 12, 1844, that Tischendorf left Cairo for 
Mount Sinai. Crossing the desert by the usual route, he 
reached the sacred mountain twelve days later, and was 
cordially received and entertained by the monks of the 
convent. While searching in the library he discovered in 
the corner of the room a box used for rubbish. In this box 
he noticed some parchment leaves, and his practiced eye at 
once saw that the writing was in Old Greek capitals, known 
as uncials, and that it was a part of the Old Testament writ- 
ten at a very early period. It proved to be a part of the 
now famous copy of the Scriptures, the oldest now known 
to exist; but at that time he was able to find only a few 
leaves of the parchment. Ten years later he made another 
trip to Sinai, but failed to discover the coveted treasure. 

* "From Egypt to Palestine," pages 261-264. 



460 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Finally, in 1859, fifteen years after his first trip, Teschendorf 
succeeded in gaining from the Russian Government finan- 
cial aid and moral support, which enabled him to visit 
Sinai again. He reached the place Jan. 31, 1859, and began 
his search for the missing leaves; but he searched in vain 
until the afternoon of Feb. 4, when the steward of the con- 
vent called his attention to a manuscript which he had laid 
away. To the great joy of the German scholar it proved to 
be the missing manuscript, an entire copy of the New Tes- 
tament, and a part of the Old. His long, patient search 
had been amply rewarded. The discovery has made his 
name famous. After many perplexities and difficulties he 
was enabled to make a copy of the manuscript, and finally 
succeeded in placing the original in the library at St. Pe- 
tersburg, Russia, where it still remains. We now have pho- 
tographic copies of the original. 

3 This valuable manuscript contains twenty-six books of 
the Old Testament, all of the New, and the Epistle of 
Barnabas, with a part of the Epistle of Hermas. It is just- 
ly regarded by scholars as the most important manuscript 
copy of the New Testament now known to exist. Tischen- 
dorf rendered great service to Christianity by his valuable 
discovery and his persistent efforts to secure this copy of 
the Scriptures. His name will be associated with the New 
Testament until the end shall come. 

Dr. Schaff visited Tischendorf some time after his dis- 
covery and says: -He was the happiest theologian I ever 
knew.' He never got over the intense satisfaction of the 
discovery which would immortalize a man of far less learn- 
ing and merit than Tischendorf. His indomitable perse- 
verance in the search and subsequent publication of the 
manuscripts in these forms is almost without parallel in the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 461 

history of literature. He lived long enough* to utilize this 
and all other important sources of the text in the critical 
apparatus of the eighth edition of his large Greek Tes- 
tament." 



* Teschendorf died in 1874. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 



Leaving Suez.— Journeying to the Land of Canaan.— On the Canal 
Again.— Farewell to Egypt.— A Comforting Prophecy.— Jaffa.— 
Dangerous Landing.— Our Old Dragoman.— Suleiman the Boat- 
man.— A Sample of Turkish Justice —Improvements at Jaffa.— 
The Landing-place. — The Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway,— Com- 
merce. — House of Simon the Tanner .—Praying on the Housetop — 
Flat Roofs.— Breaking up the Roof —Continued Dropping on a 
Rainy Day.— The Grass on the Housetop and a Wasted Life.— 
Dorcas.— The Tanneries. — Wrecked Ships.— The Marketplace.— 
The Blind. 



HE time for leaving Suez came none too soon a 



"ilJti we had completed our work at that place, and we 
^Pleft without the slightest degree of reluctance. 
Aside from the great historical associations connected with 
the locality the place is without interest to the traveler. 
Turning away from the Red Sea we set our faces toward 
Palestine and the City of Jerusalem. Nine years ago the 
writer visited and spent some time in the Holy Land, and 
now, under God's blessing, we are to return again to the 
"Land of sacred song and story." We are again to go up 
to Jerusalem and walk about its streets and around its 
walls. We are to revisit the Garden of Gethsemane, the 
Mount of Olives and the Vale of Kidron. But let us not 
anticipate. 

By railway from Suez to Ismailia, with a repetition of 
the unpleasant experience of a ride across the sands of the 
desert, and we are again on the Egyptian mail steamer 
skimming over the waters of the Suez Canal for Port Said, 




WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



465 



from which place we are to set sail for Jaffa. On the 
canal we meet and pass many large steamers, either going 
to or returning from India, China, or Australia. These 
show the importance of this great water way to the com- 
merce of the world. Our photogravure presents a scene 
that may be witnessed almost any day on the canal. At 
Port Said we rest a day and then board the Austrian Lloyd 
steamer Achilles and are soon steaming away from the 
land of the Pharaohs to the Land of Promise. Looking 
back from the deck of our steamer we see the coast line 
grow dimmer and dimmer as the shades of evening come 
down upon us, and then sink away; and so we lose sight of 
Egypt perhaps forever, and bid farewell to the 

" Land of the palm-tree and pyramid, 
Land of sweet waters from a mystic urn." 

Turning away from Egypt and her hidden mysteries of 
the past we ask, What of her future? The prophets de- 
nounced her and we have seen that the words of the Lord 
have been literally fulfilled. She has become desolate, 
without a prince; but the future holds the promise of pros- 
perity for her. The same prophet who proclaimed the 
judgments of the Lord against her also told of a time when 
the Egyptians should return unto the Lord, and he would be 
gracious to them and heal them: 

" In that day there shall be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land 
of Egypt, 

And a pillar at the border thereof to the Lord. 

And it shall be for a sign and for a witness unto the Lord of hosts in 

the land of Egypt:- 
For they shall cry unto the Lord because of the oppressors, 
And He shall send them a saviour, and a great one, and He shall de- 
liver them. 

And the Lord shall be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians shall 
know the Lord in that day; 



466 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

And shall do sacrifice and oblation; yea, they shall vow a, vow unto 

the Lord, and perform it. 
And the Lord shall smite Egypt: He shall smite and heal it: 
And they shall return even to the Lord, 
And He shall be entreated of them, and shall heal them. 
In that day shall there be a highway out of Egypt to Assyria, 
And the Assyrian shall come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into As- 
syria, 

And the Egyptians shall serve with the Assyrians. 

In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, 

Even a blessing in the midst of the land: whom the Lord of hosts 

shall bless, saying, 
Blessed be Egypt My people, 

And Assyria the work of My hands, and Israel Mine inheritance."* 
So we leave Egypt, not without hope for her future. 
It was very early on the Lord's Day morning, even be- 
fore the dim twilight broke upon the eastern sky, when our 
ship cast anchor at Jaffa, the oldest seaport town in the 
world. The word harbor does not apply to this open road- 
stead. An indentation in the coast line, in the shape of a 
slightly-flattened semicircle, with a ledge of rocks a hun- 
dred yards from the shore, upon which many a good ship 
has been wrecked, is all there is of a harbor at Jaffa. Be- 
yond the ledge of rocks, which is partly covered by water, 
is a sheltered spot accessible to small boats only. In the 
center of the semicircle rises a steep hill, the foot of which 
is washed by the waters of the sea. On this hill, rising cit- 
adel-like above its surroundings, is the City of Jaffa. The 
sea wall against which the waters dash and break into spray 
and foam forms part of the ancient wall of the city. 

The sea at Joppa is rarely calm, and the large steamers 
seldom venture nearer than a half mile to the ledge of 
rocks before casting anchor. Very often, when the sea is 
rough and the waves run high, the ships are unable to land 
their passengers and are compelled to take them to Haifa 



* Isaiah 19: 19-2= 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 467 

or Beirut if going north, or to Port Said if on the south- 
ward way, much to the inconvenience of those who want to 
land. We had a rough passage from Port Said, and having 
had some experience in landing at Jaffa entertained fears 
that we might not be able to go ashore; and our fears were 
not lessened by the rolling and pitching of the Achilles. 
The waves were running high, the surf was breaking on the 
ledge of rocks, and it really looked as if we should have 
great difficulty in going ashore. We scanned the shore for 
some time, and at length saw several small rowboats pull 
away for the ship. The rowers worked hard and at times, 
when their boats went down into the trough of the sea, men 
and boats were entirely lost to view. In a few minutes the 
boats would again be seen on the crest of the waves and 
then disappear again. At length the boats reached the 
ship and the men climbed aboard. 

Nine years ago when the writer and wife visited Pales- 
tine we were fortunate enough to secure for our interpreter 
and dragoman Mr. Bernard Heilpern, and he proved in ev- 
ery way an efficient leader. Judge of our surprise when we 
saw among those who came aboard the Achilles our old 
dragoman. Our recognition was mutual, and we warmly 
embraced each other after the eastern custom. Mr. Heil- 
pern, as we soon learned, had been promoted and now has 
entire charge of the tourist business at Jaffa. He well de- 
serves his promotion. It seems to us that the years which 
have elapsed since we rode together nearly a month over 
the hills and valleys of Palestine have dealt gently with our 
friend and quondam dragoman. He is as full of energy and 
work as ever, and has introduced some system in landing- 
passengers. The yelling and crowding of the Arabs has 
given place to a more orderly method of going ashore. He 
said, "The sea is very rough this morning, but I have a 



468 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

strong boat and sturdy boatmen and I will take you ashore 
in safety." And he made good his word. But it all looks 
dangerous enough, climbing down the ladder on the side of 
the ship, then waiting until the little boat rises on the crest 
of a wave and then jumping in. Finally the passengers, 
some twenty in number, are all on board and our boatmen 
pull for the shore. As we near the rocks we are made fully 
aware of the dangers of the situation; but our boatmen are 
strong-armed, our little boat shoots through the surf and 
we reach the sheltered water and are soon landed. We 
thank the Lord that we are safely landed and that we have 
the privilege of revisiting the Holy Land. 

And here we refer to a sad accident which occurred 
at this place only a few months ago. It illustrates the dan- 
gers of the landing and the quality of justice under the rule 
of the Sultan of Turkey. The chief boatman at Joppa was a 
splendid specimen of the Arab race. He was a giant in 
strength, an expert swimmer, and had the courage and 
bravery born of his dangerous calling. Several years ago 
three ships were wrecked at Jaffa and a number of lives 
were lost. At the risk of his life Suleiman swam to and 
from the wrecks a number of times and each time saved a 
human life. For this gallant service he was made the re- 
cipient of valuable decorations and presents from the Rus- 
sian, French and English governments. The attention thus 
shown him aroused the jealousy of the chief of the police 
system at Jaffa. Later Suleiman, by risking his life, was 
the means of saving a number of Americans from a ship- 
wrecked boat, and in gratitude a handsome gold watch with 
a large sum of money was given to him. The jealous offi- 
cer had the hardihood to demand that the watch should be 
turned over to him, but the brave Arab boatman refused to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 469 

give up his rightful possessions. The officer indulged in 
threats, and at last his opportunity came. 

Several months before we landed a ship cast anchor at 
Jaffa. The sea was rough, but Suleiman put off with his 
boat and crew to bring the passengers ashore. There were 
twenty-four who came down the side of the ship and seated 
themselves in the ill-fated boat. Less than half that num- 
ber reached the shore alive. In passing the ledge of rocks 
a great wave struck the boat and in an instant it was over- 
turned and the passengers were struggling in the water. 
Again Suleiman saved a number of lives, but this availed 
him nothing. He was ordered to be arrested, but fled be- 
fore the officers secured him. Then they laid hold on his 
father, bound him and cast him into prison. Hearing this, 
Suleiman at once returned and gave himself up, so that his 
aged father might be released. Charges were brought 
against him for running his boat on the rocks. He was 
tried and condemned to many (perhaps twenty) years' im- 
prisonment. And to-day the brave Arab boatman is in 
prison and the jealous officer has revenge. Prominent offi- 
cials of the English government are making efforts to se- 
cure his release, but up to this time their efforts have been 
entirely fruitless. We were informed that the jealous offi- 
cer now wears Suleiman's watch. Such is the character of 
Mohammedan justice as administered in Jaffa. 

After landing we found comfortable quarters at the Je- 
rusalem Hotel, where we stopped nine years ago. The 
proprietor, instead of numbering his rooms in the usual 
way, has named a dozen of them after the twelve tribes of 
Israel. The Elder and the writer slept within the borders 
of Dan during our stay at the old seaport town of Palestine. 

, Jaffa is one among the oldest cities of the world. It 
was a flourishing city when the cedars for Solomon's Tern- 



470 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

pie were landed here and carried over to Jerusalem, and 
when Jonah came hither, fleeing from the voice of God. It 
was a flourishing city when Peter dwelt with one Simon the 
tanner by the sea, from where he was called to preach the 
Gospel to the Gentiles; and it is still a flourishing city to- 
day. Its history is as old as the Bible and is not without 
interest. An unknown poet has thus written of the ancient 
City of Jaffa: 

" Oldest of cities! Sidon of the north, 
And Kirjath-arba of the rocky south, 
And Egypt's Zoan, cannot equal thee; 
Andromeda and Perseus, if the lay 
.Of classic fable speak the truth, were here; 
Monarchs of Palestine, and kings of Tyre, 
And the brave Maccabee, have all been here; 
And Cestius with his Roman plunderers; 
And Saladin, and Baldwin, and the host 
Of fierce Crusaders from the British north, 
Once shook their swords above thee, and thy blood 
Flowed down like water to thine ancient sea." 

Like Damascus and Jerusalem, Jaffa has been de- 
stroyed many times, and as many times it has been rebuilt 
and its trade and commerce regained. The ancient cities 
of Egypt and Mesopotamia have not only been destroyed, 
but many of them have been completely obliterated, so 
that their sites have been lost; others are known to us only 
by their massive and interesting ruins. In Palestine, how- 
ever, we find it different. These ancient cities have been 
destroyed again and again, and again and again they have 
been rebuilt, and remain even unto this day with name and 
site unchanged. So Jaffa has survived the ravages of time 
and is now entering upon a period of prosperity unknown 
to the cities for centuries. 

On our second visit to the Holy Land we notice partic- 
ularly the changes which have taken place and the im- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE ' LANDS. 471 

provements that have been made since we were here be- 
fore. The first we notice is at the landing-place. Then 
passengers were either carried ashore from the small row- 
boats on the backs of the stalwart Arabs, or, if the tide 
were favorable, the boats were brought so close to the 
shore that by stepping on large, flat stones they were ena- 
bled to make the landing. Now a small but substantial 
stone pier has been constructed, with suitable steps, so that 
passengers may land from the small boats without incon- 
venience. This is a decided improvement, but one loses 
the novelty of a ride on the back of an Arab. But by far 
the greatest improvement, not only in Jaffa but in all the 
land of Palestine, is the completion of the first railway in 
the Holy Land, connecting the cities of Jaffa and Jeru- 
salem. 

We anticipate our journey up to Jerusalem in order to 
give an account of the inception and completion cf this 
railway which, without doubt, is to play an important part 
in the future history of Palestine. In writing this sketch 
we wish in a special manner to acknowledge our indebted- 
ness to Dr. Selah Merrill, United States Consul at Jerusa- 
lem, whom we met here nine years ago and now have the 
pleasure of meeting again. He was here during the build- 
ing, completion, and opening of the road and gave us many 
facts relative to the history of the enterprise. He has also 
written an exceedingly interesting account of the Jaffa and 
Jerusalem Railway, which has since been published in 
Scribners Magazine. The article is illustrated with engrav- 
ings made from photographs taken by the Doctor himself. 

As early as 1850 the project of building a railroad be- 
tween Jaffa and Jerusalem was seriously discussed, but it 
was not until 1860-63 that surveys and definite plans were 
made. After that several routes were surveyed and the 



t 



^ 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

question was more or less agitated. But it was not until 
1889 that work actually began. The road was finally com- 
pleted in August, 1892. The first through train from Jaffa 
reached the station at Jerusalem August 27, at 10 o'clock in 
the forenoon. The road was formally opened to the public 
Sept. 27, 1892, a day that will long be remembered at Jeru- 
salem. 

The surveys for the road followed three different lines: 
The southern or the one that was finally adopted, the mid- 
dle or the one following very closely the present wagon 
road between Jaffa and Jerusalem, and the northern which, 
as Dr Merrill says, was the line of the old Roman road 
from Jerusalem to Cesarea; it passed close by Mizpeh, the 
home of the prophet Samuel; it crossed the battle field 
where Joshua routed the army of the five kings, Josh. 10; 
it went down the mountain by the pass Beth-horon, where, 
in A D 66, the Twelfth Legion, under Cestius, was cut to 
pieces by the infuriated Jews; it touched Lydda where 
"saints" then "dwelt,"* a class that has long since disap- 
peared from the country; and it was the road by which Paul 
went as a prisoner. It was proposed to cross the plain in 
an easterly direction from Jaffa, climb the foothills to the 
pass of Beth-horon and thence approach Jerusalem. This 
route had historic interest and sentiment in its favor, and it 
was more than once surveyed. In iS 74 -75 French engi- 
neers surveyed and marked out the railway line along this 
route and the scheme seemed so certain that individuals 
began to think of investments along that line, in anticipa- 
tion of the road being built.f But the southern route was 
after all accepted, and Dr. Merrill gives this fragment of 
hitherto unwritten history in connection with the railway 



* Acts 9:32- 

fDr. Merrill, Scribner's Magazine, March, i»93- 



ft 

f 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 473 

project in which he says Americans should take not merely 
a curious interest, but a bit of "honest pride": 

"There was a man here named Charles Zimpel, a Prus- 
sian by birth but a naturalized American citizen, who, in 
i860 to 1863, surveyed the different routes carefully, and 
decided to lay down the line of the proposed road along 
what has been mentioned as the southern route. Air. Zim- 
pel was a man of excellent education, and of very versatile 
talents. In early life he had received a thorough military 
training. He was regularly graduated as a doctor of med- 
icine and also of philosophy. He had a special liking for 
pharmaceutical studies, took a special interest in railroad 
engineering, and bad withal a passionate love for the Holy 
Land. He was never married, he traveled extensively, and 
the year 1852 found him in Palestine examining with enthu- 
siasm its many places of interest. In 1S53 he published a 
book entitled, 'Neue Oertliche Topographische Beleuchtung der 
heiligen Wcltstadt Jerusalem: The next seven years he 
spent in the United States, devoting himself exclusively to 
the work of surveying and constructing railroads. He 
came thence to Jerusalem, having accumulated considera- 
ble means, and surveyed and mapped out the railroad as 
has been described. He spent a year in Constantinople 
trying to obtain a 'concession' for building the road, but 
without success. He returned to Jerusalem and to the 
practice of medicine. About this time it was noticed that 
he had become somewhat eccentric, and as an 'experiment- 
ing pharmacist' he discovered some wonderful remedies 
which he called Sunlight Pills, and Jerusalem Life Extract, 
in which he himself had great faith. He had also much to 
say about the ' hundred and forty and four thousand' of St. 
John's Revelation, and his hope of being worthy to be 
numbered among them. Not long after he went to Italy, 



^* WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and died at San Remo. Dr. Zimpel (simple as most peo- 
ple thought him at last) was at rest and his railroad 
scheme was practically forgotten. 

-Thirty years after this Sunlight-pill man had been in 
a land made one of perpetual sunshine and song by the 
presence of the Master whom he loved, other men entered 
into his labors. Within thirty months past, men backed by 
French capitalists have come to Palestine and, rejecting 
the northern and middle routes, have actually built a rail- 
road following minutely Dr. Zimpel's plan. The only vari- 
ations arc at two points, one near Jaffa and the other near 
Ramleh, both on the flat land, where the change was sim- 
ply a matter of convenience. Dr. Zimpel's survey made 
the road eighty kilometres in length, while the road as 
built is eighty-six and one-half kilometres. The sigmfi- 
cance of having chosen the best route may be emphasized 
in the reader's mind when it is stated that two-thirds of this 
road is on the plain and one-third in the mountains, which 
must be climbed in order to reach Jerusalem, two thousand 
feet above the level of the sea. 

-What has been said is but a brief and imperfect trib- 
ute to the memory of this well-nigh forgotten man, and if 
full justice were to be done to one to whom, as in this case, 
honor is so justly due, stronger and much more fitting 
words should have been chosen."* 

The road was finally built by a French company with 
French capital, and it is to the French that Palestine is in- 
debted for its first line of railroad. The difficulties to be 
overcome were many and great. About everything used in 
the construction and equipment of the road.-ties rails, iron 
bridges, spikes, cars and engines, -had to be shipped to 
Jaffa on steamers and taken ashore. When we consider 

* ^7h7Selah Merrill, Scribner's Magazine, March, 1893. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 475 

the difficulty of landing* passengers the magnitude of this 1 
Work is intensified. Laborers to work in stone and in the 
mountains had to be brought from Switzerland and Italy. 
It WM found that while the native Arabs could work in the 
loose soil and sand of the plain, when it came to working 
in stone, tunneling and cutting away the mountain, and 
building bridges, they were entirely worthless. 

It is a matter of interest to Americans that all the en- 
gines used on the road were manufactured by the Baldwin 
Locomotive Works at Philadelphia, Pa. The steam whistle, 
as it awakened the echoes on the plain of Sharon or rever- 
berated among the hills of Judea, had a home-like sound. 

The wages paid the laborers who made the road-bed 
seem quite inadequate to us: from twenty to thirty cents 
per day was paid for work on the plain, while the more 
skilled workmen who labored in the mountains received 
from seventy cents to one' dollar per day, and furnished 
their own food. In our own country we should call these 
starvation wages; but we have not yet learned the lesson of 
economy, taught by want, that has become a part of the 
life of the laborers in many parts of Europe and the East. 
Two years and a half it required to build the fifty-three 
miles of railroad between the seaport and the capital of 
Palestine. The cost was not far from two million dollars, 
and in our judgment the stockholders will not grow rich 
from the dividends. Four dollars will buy a first-class 
round-trip ticket from Jerusalem to Jaffa, good for two 
days, but the tourist who lands at the seaport must pay 
four dollars for a ticket to the Holy City. During the en- 
tire summer, say from May until November, no tourists 
land at Jaffa and the road will have no use for its engines 
and cars. 



^76 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The effect of this line of railway, in many respects the 
most important in the world, upon the future of Palestine, 
who can tell? It will doubtless revolutionize the entire 
country. Already the English, not to be outdone by the 
French, are building a road from Haifa, a port at the foot 
of Mt. Carmel, across the country to Nazareth and the Sea 
of Galilee, with Damascus as the final objective point. 
This may, and doubtless will, be the beginning of a new era 
of prosperity for the Holy Land, and in it all there may be 
the hand of God who rules the destinies of men and na- 
tions. The ruler of Turkey, who so long refused a conces- 
sion to build the railway, at last consented, and this is only 
another evidence that the semibarbarism of the Moham- 
medan religion must in the end give way to Christian civil- 
ization. The Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway is a great object 
lesson to the natives, and it is doubtless the beginning of 
the end of Moslem rule in Syria. England and France are 
always ready to look after the interests' of their own peo- 
ple, and since English and French capital is building rail- 
ways in Palestine, neither of these nations would hesitate, 
in case of war, to claim a protectorate over the country, 
just as England has done with Egypt. Then, too, the bur- 
den of prophecy rests upon Palestine; in God's own good 
time it will be fulfilled, and the desolation of Canaan will 
be turned into prosperity. The Lord uses nations to bring 
about results, and he may use France and England now as 
he used Darius and Alexander the Great to accomplish his 
purposes so many centuries ago. 

Jaffa has not only improved in having a railway and a 
new pier for landing, but the city has grown in population 
and in trade. It is always a difficult matter to ascertain 
the population of a Mohammedan town or city, but there 
are certainly not less than twenty thousand inhabitants in 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 477 

Jaffa now. One of the principal products of the place and 
its surroundings is oranges. The fine orange groves about 
the city are the admiration of all travelers, and the fruit 
grown here is probably not equaled for fine flavor and juici- 
ness in any other part of the world. We walked through 
the orange groves and gardens and among the men gather- 
ing and packing the luscious fruit. The owner of one of 
the groves gave each of us a half dozen of the largest or- 
anges we had ever seen. Two of the largest measured, the 
one fourteen, the other sixteen inches in circumference. 

Jaffa now ships oranges to every port on the Mediter- 
ranean Sea and also to London and other European cities. 
The result is that a good market is opened up for the fruit, 
better prices are realized and the orange grower prospers. 
The total annual exportation reaches the large number of 
sixty million oranges. These figures will give some idea of 
the immense crop that is grown. Jaffa also exports more 
than half a million dollars worth of native soap. Judging 
from the looks of the natives, they sell much more soap 
than they use. With its oranges, soap, wheat, barley, olive 
oil and other commodities, its commerce amounts to some 
millions of dollars annually. The railway will of course 
tend to increase this already increasing trade, and Jaffa 
may yet become a commercial center of considerable im- 
portance. The town is Mohammedan, but its prosperity is 
not clue to the Moslem but to the Christian element in it. 

We spent our time here in looking about the city and 
walking along the seashore and among the gardens and 
groves. Not many places of special interest are to be seen. 
The house of Simon the tanner and that of Dorcas are 
pointed out, but of course no one supposes for a moment 
that the modern buildings shown to travelers are the hous- 
es that stood here when Peter was in Jaffa. Of course we 



. WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

went to the house of Simon the tanner, as we did when we 
were here before. The present building, without doubt, 
stands near where the house of Simon stood and may for 
aught we know occupy the same ground. It is by the sea- 
side,* and not far away are the tanneries, where doubtless 
Simon worked when Peter lodged with him. A strong 
stone stairway, built against the outer wall of the house, 
leads to the housetop which is almost flat. It was doubt- 
less to the top of a house like this that Peter came up "to 
pray about the sixth hour." As we climbed up the stair- 
way and reached the top of the house, judge of our surprise 
when we saw a man kneeling there earnestly engaged in 
prayer. How singular it is that the custom of going on the 
housetop to pray should have been kept up all these centu- 
ries, since the time when the great apostle who first 
preached the Gospel to the Gentiles was in the habit of 
coming to the top of the house to pray just as we see this 
man praying here to-day. We sat down and read from our 
Bible the tenth chapter of Acts, and it all seemed so real 
with the man yonder kneeling in prayer that we almost felt 
that we had been carried back to the time when the tanner 
dwelt here and had a lodger, "one Simon, whose surname 

was Peter."t How real scenes like this make the story ° f 
the Bible, and how near they bring the incidents recorded 
in the Book to us as we witness them to-day. 

On the top of the house and growing out of the crev- 
ices in the wall we saw a number of bunches of the hyssopj 
of the Bible. We gathered some of the leaves and flowers 
of the plant and came down the stone stairway. At the 
foot of the steps is a very old well from which water has 



* Acts to: 6; Acts 10: 9, 
t Acts 10: S- 
% Heb. 9: i9- 



1 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



been drawn for centuries. The attendant drew water for us, 
which we found rather pleasant to the taste. Our photo- 
gravure shows the well, and a large stone water tank stand- 
ing near by. The attendant is in the act of drawing water 
with his rude windlass. Beyond him is to be seen the step 
by which the ascent to the housetop is made. Bunches of 
hyssop are also to be seen growing out of the wall above 
the window. The picture is an exact reproduction of a 
part of the house of Simon the tanner at Jaffa, and if any 
of our readers have ever been there they will recognize it at 
once. 

The Bible contains many references to houses and 
housetops, all of which are made very plain and clear in 
the light thrown upon them by the manners and customs of 
the people in Palestine to-day. The flat roof and the outer 
stairway made the top of the house easy of access, and 
then it was a quiet place where one might be alone, hence a 
suitable place for meditation and prayer. The houses in 
the towns and villages are low and the roofs, as before 
stated, are flat. Beams are laid across from wall to wall 
and on top of these is thrown a quantity of earth which is 
stamped until it becomes quite solid and protects the in- 
mates from ordinary rain storms. 

With this construction of the house and roof in mind it 
is easy to understand how the men who carried the one 
sick with the palsy proceeded to place him before the Sav- 
ior. "And when they could not come nigh unto him for 
the press, they uncovered the roof where he was: and when 
they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the 
sick of the palsy lay."* The uncovering of the roof, the 
lifting aside of the beams, the carrying the sick man up by 
the outer stairway, the kneeling down and holding to the 

* Mark 2: 4. 



482 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

four corners of the bed in which the sick lay, letting it 
down before the Master, are all clear enough as we exam- 
ine the houses. 

The roofs made of earth become water-soaked during 
the long, continued storms of the rainy seasons and then 
they leak in a very annoying manner. It was to this con- 
tinual dripping of the water through the roof that Solomon 
was indebted for one of his striking proverbs: "A contin- 
ual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman 
are alike."* Dr. Thomson relates his experience in one of 
these houses during a long, continued rain storm and says: 
"This continual dropping— tuk—tuk— all day long and all 
night, if not the most annoying thing in the world, can only 
be exceeded by the ceaseless clatter of a contentious wom- 
an." We presume Solomon and the Doctor knew whereof 
they wrote, the former doubtless from experience, and with 
our knowledge of the leaky roofs of the houses in Palestine 
we can see the force of the proverb, and of the Doctor's ex- 
perience. 

On the top of the earthen roofs just at the close of the 
rainy season the coarse grass springs up very quickly and 
as quickly disappears, when the clouds are dispersed and 
the hot rays of the sun strike the tender shoots. Because 
it has no depth of soil it withers away, dries up, and is 
blown away by the wind. It is entirely useless and worth- 
less. We have seen the grass thus growing on many hous- 
es in Palestine, and to this David refers when he says: "Let 
them be as the grass upon the housetops, which withereth 
afore it groweth up: wherewith the mower filleth not his 
hand; nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom. "f What a 
picture of a wasted life is here drawn in a few words! And 



* Prov. 27: IS- 
t Ps, 129: 6, 7, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 483 

the illustration is intensified when we see the real picture 
from which it is taken. How many men and women there 
are who waste their lives and are like the grass that grows 
on the housetop! They start with fair promise of the fu- 
ture, but the hour of temptation comes and they fall, and 
when the end comes only a wasted, useless life goes out. 
No hand has been filled with kindly deeds by them; they 
have filled no bosom with joy because of a noble life, — 
wrecked and wasted is written over against their lives. 
How strong and how wonderfully apt is the illustration 
drawn by the Psalmist from the grass growing on the 
housetop. The prophet Isaiah al so used the same illustra- 
tion, coupling with it the blasted corn and the green herb, 
when he came to comfort Hezekiah -and strengthen him 
against the Assyrian.* 

Zephaniah takes up a denunciation against those who go 
to the roofs of their houses, not to pray to the living God, 
but to engage in idolatrous worship. They "that worship 
the host of heaven upon the housetops, "f he says, shall be 
cut off from among the people. The language clearly im- 
plies that there were some among the Israelites who wor- 
shiped the sun, moon and stars, and that they assembled on 
their housetops to carry on their devotion. 

Proclamations were also very frequently made from the 
housetops to the people of the towns and villages. It was 
a convenient place to reach, and overlooked the streets 
thus forming an excellent rostrum. It was to this custom 
that the Master referred when he said, "That which ye 
have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon 
the housetops. "J We saw and heard this Scripture illus- 

* Isa. 37: 27. 
fZeph. 1:5. 
$ Luke 12: 3. 



484 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

trated one evening while wandering alone in the valleys of 
Jehoshaphat and Hinnom just southeast of Jerusalem. We 
passed by the village of Siloam, and just before we reached 
the junction of the valleys a man appeared on one of the 
housetops in the village and began speaking in a loud, 
clear voice. The evening was hushed and still and the 
speaker woke the echoes along the valley and the eastern 
wall of Jerusalem. We did not understand a single word 
he said, but we knew that he was proclaiming from the 
housetop, and we saw and heard just what the Savior re- 
ferred to in the Scripture quoted. 

The house pointed out as that of Dorcas has neither 
tradition nor landmark favoring the site, and it is so mani- 
festly a modern building that we pass it by without other 
interest than that it recalls vividly to mind the almsdeeds, 
the death and the miraculous raising from the dead of the 
Jaffa " disciple named Tabitha, which by interpretation is 
called Dorcas." Peter at that time was at Lydda, distant 
but twelve miles from Jaffa. He had just raised the sick 
^neas, "which had kept his bed eight years, and was sick 
of the palsy."* To him they sent posthaste with the tid- 
ings of the death of the woman whom they all loved, desir- 
ing that he would not delay to come to them. Peter 
doubtless left Lydda hurriedly, and if he did not know the 
love and esteem which the poor of Jaffa had for Dorcas, he 
soon learned of it, for "when he was come, they brought 
him into the upper chamber: and all the widows stood by 
him weeping, and showing the coats and garments which 
Dorcas made, while she was with them."t Then came 
the notable miracle of raising the dead, which has made 
Jaffa famous ever since. There is a naturalness about the 



* Acts 9: 33- 
f Acts 9: 39- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 485 

incident and the account given by the author of the Acts 
that carries conviction with it, and when it is seen in its ori- 
ental surroundings it becomes all the more real. Dorcas, 
with but a needle in her hand, did a work among the poor 
that will be told over and over again as long as the Gospel 
is preached, and her good example has induced other good 
women, with the love of God and of humanity in their 
hearts, to do as she did, until we have hundreds of Dorcas 
societies all over the lands where Christianity prevails. 

Leaving the so-called house of Dorcas and going 
southward from the place where Simon the tanner dwelt, 
we continue our walk along the seashore. Here are the 
tanneries and here they have been since the clays of Peter. 
Without doubt he walked along this same shore in compa- 
ny with the tanner and saw the restless billows break and 
waste their strength on the sand beneath his feet, as we see 
them to-day. If he had a love for the beautiful he no 
doubt gathered up the beautiful, colored shells painted by 
the hand of the Creator and admired their beauty just as 
the Elder and the writer did in their long walk on the sea- 
shore. But we must curb our imagination and tell of what 
is now here. 

We notice that the tanners use the sea as a great soak- 
ing tank. A long, heavy chain is securely fastened to the 
shore and its full length is stretched out in the water. To 
this the skins are lashed and here they remain until they 
are ready for the tanner's block. They are then taken out 
and treated much in the same manner as in tanneries in 
other parts of the world. The goat skin after being tanned 
is dyed either red or yellow, and is made into shoes. The 
religion of the wearer is made known by the color of his 
shoes. The Mohammedans wear yellow and the Christians 
red leather. Reference is made to this custom of dyeing 



486 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

skins in Exodus. When the people brought together a 
free-will offering for the tabernacle, among other things 
they brought the "red skins of rams, and badger skins."* 

Both to the north and south of Jaffa as we walked 
along the seashore we saw the broken hulls and ribs of a 
number of ships that had been wrecked on the rocky reefs 
on the coast at this place. These wrecks are an unpleasant 
reminder of the dangerous character of the port of Jaffa. 
Many a good, staunch ship has been wrecked and pounded 
to pieces on the rocks at this place since Jonah's ship was 
overtaken by a storm as it sailed away from Jaffa and was 
finally saved only by throwing the runaway prophet over- 
board. Since then the sea along this coast has opened its 
insatiable mouth and swallowed seafaring men, pilgrims 
and travelers by the thousand. Just now there is some talk 
of a sea wall and a pier for large steamers, and since the 
railroad has been built such an improvement may be made. 
If it were, hundreds who are now deterred from visiting 
southern Palestine because of the dangerous landing would 
gladly go. 

The streets of Jaffa present a lively appearance on 
market day and we were much interested in wandering 
about the market and noting what was going on. The 
market-place of any city is a good place to study the peo- 
ple, and especially is this true of eastern cities. Almost 
the entire population is to be seen on the streets and at the 
market-place. Here are lemons and oranges, pomegran- 
ates and quinces, apples and apricots, and all kinds of fruit 
and vegetables in their season, which are produced in the 
extensive gardens of Jaffa. The villagers bring their sheep 
and goats, their lambs and kids, their cows and calves, 
their milk and butter and cheese, their poultry and eggs, 



*Ex. 35:23. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 487 

their figs and olives, and every other kind of fruit, fresh or 
dry, which they possess; in baskets or round trays or small 
earthen jugs, in jars or in large skin bottles, on camels or 
mules, on horses or donkeys, on the heads of men or boys, 
women or girls, are they brought and set down here to be 
sold* The selling is carried on amid much quarreling and 
bickering. Looking at buyer and seller you are persuaded 
by their angry talk and violent gesticulation that they will 
at once come to blows; but this rarely occurs. It is only 
their way of buying and selling. Many of those who come 
to the market are ragged and filthy, and, to judge by their 
appearance, must be wretchedly poor. Many of them do 
not have sufficient clothing to hide their nakedness. 
Around about the market-place and in the streets leading 
to it are the beggars. Some are blind, others with painful 
physicaldeffects— all appealing in the most pitiful and be- 
seeching tones for alms. These are the beggars by the 
wayside, and they are to be seen all over the Land of Pal- 
estine. Here one is reminded over and over again of the 
blind son of Timasus who sat by the wayside near Jericho 
begging from those who passed by. The Savior came that 
way, and the blind man when he "heard that it was Jesus 
of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son 
of David, have mercy on me."f Then came the call of the 
Master to the blind and the question, "What wilt thou that 
I should do unto thee?" How quick came the reply of 
him who was afflicted, and as quickly the Master restored 
his sight. 

Blindness and diseases of the eye are very common in 
Palestine, and in this country in a single day one will see 
more men and women who have lost the sight of one eye 

* " The Land and the Book," page 25. 
t Mark 10: 47. 



4 gg WANDERINGS IN BIBLE! LANDS. 

or are totally blind than in half a lifetime in the United 
States, unless it were in some institution for those who 
have lost their sight. When the Savior was here he found 
the blind in every village and city in the land. They sat 
by the wayside begging then as they do to-day, and as he 
passed by he healed them. What wonder then that the 
blind called to him when they knew he was passing, as did 
the blind Bartimaeus at Jericho, and how the poor unfortu- 
nate fellows must have crowded upon him, even leaving 
their outer garments behind so that they might go unhin- 
dered to the one Physician who could restore their sight! 
And as they went away seeing, what rejoicing there must 
have been amongst them all! To-day there is no one in 
Palestine to restore sight to the blind. Thousands lose 
their sight from exposure and neglect of the eyes. An oc- 
ulist could here find a great field for mitigating human suf- 
fering Then, too, the people are also suffering from spir- 
itual blindness. What a field for the earnest missionary 
who will carry to the people the Gospel of Christ and open 
their spiritual eyes! 




CHAPTER XXVII. 

From Jaffa to Jerusalem. - « Blest Land of Judear -Sentiment De- 
stroyed.- Sharon s Plain.- Plowing.- Lydda.-The Healing of 
Aeneas.-Ramleh.-A rich Land.-The Home of ^pn - The 
Foxes.-Mountain Scenery .-Terraced Hills.-The Shepherd and 
his Flock.- The Valley of Roses.- The Plain of Rephaim.-The 
Defeat of the Philistines.— Jerusalem.— A Contrast. 

I ROM Jaffa to Jerusalem by railway robs this most 
' interesting journey of much of its old-time senti- 
ment and brings it down to the common place of 
every-day life. The first feeling that comes to us as we 
stand on the platform at the depot at Jaffa and hear the 
bell ring and the voice of the conductor shouting, "All 
aboard for Jerusalem," is that a great sacrilege has been 
committed in the very act of building a railroad m the Ho- 
ly Land It all seems out of place, with its surroundings. 
One likes to think of the land where the Master was born 
and lived as she was before these modern innovations came 
to her with her hallowed associations and tender memories 
unbroken by the march of nineteenth century improve- 
ments. One likes to give way to thoughts such as inspired 
our own Quaker poet when he wrote: 

" Blest land of Judea! thrice hallowed in song, 

Where the holiest of memories pilgrim-like throng; 
• In the shade of thy palms, by the shores of thy sea, 
On the hills of thy beauty, my heart is with thee. 
" With the eve of a spirit I look on that shore, 

Where pilgrim and prophet have lingered before; 
With the glide of a spirit I traverse the sod 

Made bright by the steps of the angels of God. 



490 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 4 gi 

" Blue sea of the hills!— in my spirit I hear 

Thy waters, Genessaret, chime on my ear; 
Where the Lowly and Just with the people sat down, 
And thy spray on the dust of his sandals was thrown. 
****** 

" I tread where the twelve in their wayfaring trod; 
I stand where they stood with the chosen of God, 
Where his blessing was heard and his lessons were taught; 
Where the blind were restored and the healing was wrought. 
"O here with his flock the sad wanderer came — 
These hills he toiled over in grief are the same — 
The founts where he drank by the wayside still flow, 

And the same airs are blowing that breathed on his brow! 
"And throned on her hills sits Jerusalem yet, 

But the dust on her forehead, and chains on her feet; 
For the crown of her pride to the mocker hath gone, 
And the holy Shekinah is dark where it shone." 

It is in this mood that one loves to linger among- the 
holy and blessed associations of the Land of Canaan, and 
live again in imagination and in spirit in the days 'long 
since gone. But to rush across the beautiful and fertile 
plain of Sharon, beautiful yet amid, all its desolation, at the 
rate of forty miles an hour, and to dash up the picturesque 
valleys among the quiet and peaceful hills of Judea, and to 
hear their echoes awakened by sound of steam whistle and 
rushing train, takes one with a great leap from the first to 
the nineteenth century and from the realm of sentiment to 
that of this practical age of steam and electricity. But, as 
Dr. Merrill observes, we all believe that Providence is wise- 
ly guiding the march of civilization, and hence there can be 
nothing unholy in the fact that its advance guard, the rail- 
way, has reached Palestine and the sound of the steam 
whistle reverberates about the walls of ancient Jerusalem. 

But while we meditate and philosophize the bell rings, 
the whistle sounds, and we are off on the way to the Holy 



4 g 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

City We leave the gardens of Jaffa far behind us, cross 
the sand along the seashore and are out upon the plain of 
Sharon Our little company has been doubled. At Cairo 
we met and enjoyed the company of Mr. Geo. Holmes, 
Traveling Secretary of the Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion of London, and at Jaffa we had the pleasure of meet- 
ing him again. Dr. Simpson, of New York, President of the 
Evangelical Missionary Society, on a tour of missionary in- 
spection, we met at Port Said. Both these friends are with 
us and we enjoy the association very much. 

The day is bright and clear and warm enough to be de- 
lightfully pleasant. The plain of Sharon presents a busy 
picture of farm life, for it is the season of plowing and sow- 
ing The one-handled plows that have been in use on this 
plain and in the valleys of Palestine since the days of Abra- 
ham are still in use. We are again reminded of the lan- 
guage of the Master, "No man, having put his hand to the 
plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."* 
This apt illustration shows that the one-handled plow of to- 
day was used when he taught the great lessons of the Gos- 
pel here nearly two thousand years ago. Nine years ago 
when we rode across the plain of Sharon we saw men plow- 
ing and sowing as we see them to-day; no change has been 
made. 

The rude implement used for plowing is in many cases 
made after the pattern used by the fathers centuries ago. 
Occasionally we notice a slight attempt at improvement, 
but for the most part the farmers on the plains of Sharon, 
like the fathers of the shaduf in Egypt, are not wiser than 
their fathers, and are quite content to use the same kind of 
agricultural implements used by them. The plows that we 
examined were very simple in their construction, A 



* Luke 9: 62. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 493 

strong, tough piece of wood about three and a half feet 
long serves as a post, to one end of which is fastened the 
plowshare and to the other the handle. Near the center is 
mortised a hole, into which a long pole is securely fastened, 
which may be called a beam or, better still, a tongue. It is 
long enough to reach to the yoke on the necks of the oxen, 
to which it is fastened by a rope, or piece of rawhide. One 
end of the post is pointed and is sometimes armed with a 
piece of iron. This is the plowshare to which reference is 
made in Joel 3: 10. The upper end of the post is fitted 
with a short, round crosspiece of wood, which serves as a 
handle. 

With one hand the farmer grasps the handle of his 
plow; in the other he carries a strong pole about eight feet 
long, armed at one end with an iron bit, or chisel, used for 
scraping the dirt from the plow, and, at the other, with a 
sharp spear; and this is the ox-goad. We examined one of 
these ox-goads closely and could well believe that it might 
become a powerful and deadly weapon in the hands of a 
strong man, as the Philistines found, to their sorrow, when 
Shamgar, son of Anath, slew of them six hundred men with 
only such a weapon as this.* 

At one place we induced a plowman to let us try his 
implement. The Arab looked on, much amused at our 
vain efforts to handle the rude implement with one hand 
and make it work. It was a difficult task, and we soon 
gave it up, quite willing to admit that the Arab was the 
better plowman. We learned that if he who puts his hand 
to the plow would accomplish any work he must look for- 
ward and keep his eye on his work. The lesson taught by 
the Savior is apparent. The Christian must look forward, 

* Judges 3:31. 



494 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and not backward, if he is to become fit for the kingdom 
of God. 

Twelve miles from Jaffa we reach Ludd, the first stop- 
ping-place and station on the way to Jerusalem. A grove 
of tall palm trees, their feathery branches waving in the air, 
give the place the appearance of an Egyptian town. Fine 
old olive groves also add much to the attractions of the 
place. These groves cover some twelve square miles of the 
plain about Ludd and Ramleh, the next station, only two 
miles away, and the vigorous growth of the trees shows 
that the plain of Sharon has lost none of its old-time 
fertility. 

Ludd is the Lod* of the Hebrews and the Lydda of 
the New Testament. It was occupied by the Benjamites 
after the captivity, and attained to some importance be- 
cause it was located on the principal caravan route between 
Egypt and Syria. It was to Lydda that Peter came 
preaching the Gospel and visiting all the saints; and "he 
found a certain man ^neas, which had kept his bed eight 
years, and was sick of the palsy. And Peter said unto him, 
^Eneas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole: arise, and make 
thy bed. And he arose immediately. And all that dwelt 
at Lydda and Saron saw him, and turned to the Lord."f 
There must have been a wonderful revival in those days 
around about Lydda on the plain of Sharon. Everybody 
in the town was converted and turned to the Lord, and the 
news of what was done spread into the country and the 
Sharonites all embraced Christianity. The preaching of 
the Word and the working of the miracle had a powerful 
effect on the minds of the people. 

* i Chron. 8: 12; Neh. 11: 35- 
f Acts 9: 32-35. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. . 495 

During the reign of Nero Lydda was destroyed by his 
general, Cestius Gallus, but it was rebuilt again, and in 
A. D. 445 a great church council was held there, at which 
Pelagius was tried for heresy and ably defended himself. 
It is now an unimportant village, saving that it is a railway 
station, and this may, if the road proves a success, bring it 
into more prominence again. 

Ramleh, on the carriage road between Jaffa and Jerusa- 
lem, is the next station on the railway and is fourteen miles 
from the former place. Here nine years ago we saw the 
lepers for the first time and here they are yet. Perhaps not 
those we saw then, for doubtless they perished long ago, 
but others have taken their places. The coming of the 
train into the stations seems to be a source of great curios- 
ity to the natives. They collect in groups and watch the 
coming and going of the trains with open-eyed wonder 
The Arab is slow and uncertain. He will invariably put off 
until to-morrow what he ought to do to-day, and then to- 
morrow he will, if possible, put it off again. One source of 
surprise to him is that the trains should come and go on 
time. When the road was first opened for travel and the 
time card arranged, the Arab who wished to avail himself 
of its advantages invariably came too late for the train. 
He could not understand why it should go on time and 
that he should be left behind. He and his fathers have 
been traveling for so many centuries on camels and don- 
keys and on foot that it will take some time to teach him 
that there is a vast difference between railroading and 
camel riding. 

From Ramleh to Es Sejed, where the engines are sup- 
plied with water from a spring, the road crosses over ten 
miles of rich, level land which reminds us of our own west- 
ern prairies. With proper tillage and care it would pro- 



496 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

duce abundant harvests. Indeed the entire plain of Sharon 
has the appearance of our rich prairie country. Replace 
the native villages with farmhouses, barns and well-kept 
farmyards; the one-handled implements used for scratch- 
ing the soil with steel clipper riding plows; the sower and 
his basket of grain with the seeding machine; the hand 
sickle with the reaper and self-binder; the threshing floor 
and the unmuzzled oxen treading out the grain with the 
steam thresher, and the change would be so complete that 
one would at once imagine himself on the western prairies. 
The railroad is already here; will the other improvements 
come ? If so the country will be revolutionized. As it 
is now the railway seems quite out of place with its sur- 
roundings. It is a bit of nineteenth century progress set 
back in the lap of the first. 

We are now passing over a country of great historic in- 
terest. Here may be pointed out Gezer, once a royal city of 
the ancient Canaanites. Yonder are the great hills guard- 
ing Beth-horon, the scene of Joshua's memorable battle. 
From yonder height he may have looked down upon the 
valley of Ajalon while the battle raged. It was here that 
he overcame the five kings and slew them. The pleadings 
of the king of Jerusalem for help, sent to the king of Egypt 
and found on the Tell Amarna Tablets, availed him noth- 
ing, and he was put to death with his comrades. 

' Another stop and we are at Deir Aban at the foot of 
the bold and rugged mountains of Judea. Of this place 
and of the journey to Bittir, the next station, fourteen miles 
distant, Dr. Merrill says: "We are in the country of Sam- 
son, and probably near the place of his birth and burial; 
and in a land where there are twenty foxes to one jackal, 
and where hundreds of them are caught every year, we may 
be allowed to suppose, contrary to the opinion of 'learned 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



497 



commentators,' that the former, and not the latter, were the 
instruments of his vengeance upon the Philistines. We 
now pass through wild and romantic scenery, of which even 
Switzerland might be proud. The gorges, the cliffs, the 
peaks rising skyward, the masses of broken rock, the deep 
cuttings for the road-bed, the bridges, the few clusters of 
olive trees deep in the valley or clinging to a little earth far 
up on the mountain side, make a picture in which there is 
an endless charm. In the Alps there is in winter an abun- 
dance of ice which helps to disintegrate the rocks, and 
which forms streamlets of beauty; in the w r aterless Judean- 
hills the rocks look old and time-worn, barren and dry. In 
the Alps the patches of earth in valley or on mountain side 
are made fruitful and attractive by untiring and skillful in- 
dustry; in the Judean hills neglect is everywhere apparent 
and the result is desolation. Were the same kind of skill 
and persistent energy spent here every year that is spent in 
the Alps, this aspect of desolation would in a large measure 
be removed. At the same time, unassisted nature does all 
in her power to remedy these defects, and those travelers 
who see Palestine in the spring may think the description 
just given to be overdrawn. 

"At Bittir the mountains recede or bend round in such 
a way as to form a vast natural amphitheatre, in the middle 
of which the town is situated. Below the village are large 
vegetable gardens for supplying the Jerusalem market,— 
gardens most attractive in this worn-out land. The view 
down the gorge to the west and up the valley for miles to 
the north, its superb air, and the fact that its fountain af- 
fords an unfailing water supply, mark this as the place for 
a summer hotel — the delightful retreat of the Jerusalemites 
from the city's stifling and dusty atmosphere. Rising far 
above the town is a long, oval ridge covered with ancient 



493 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



ruins, admirable for a place of defense, and called the Ruin 
of the Jews. It is the traditional site of the city and 
stronghold Bethar, when in the second revolt against Rome, 
A. D. 132-136, Bar Cochab and his brave followers made 
a memorable resistance against the Roman troops, but at 
last were compelled to yield, the famous Hebrew patriot 
himself perishing in the final slaughter."* 

The abundant water supply at Bittir makes it an im- 
portant station on the railway. Water is carried from here 
to Jerusalem, eight miles away, and stored in great tanks 
for the use of the engines. The station at Jerusalem is 
without a natural supply of water. At Jaffa there is a well, 
another at Ramleh, and these, with the fountains at Es 
Sejed and at Bittir, furnish all the water for the railway. 

The hillsides along the valleys both north and south of 
Bittir show very plainly the ancient terraces, for when the 
country was at the high tide of its prosperity all these hills 
were covered with orchards and vineyards, and the valleys 
were blooming gardens. Commencing at the foot of the 
mountain the stones were loosened and built into a strong 
wall from eight to ten feet high, and between the wall and 
the sloping hill the space was filled up with the loose earth. 
In this way a level surface of earth some twenty feet wide 
was formed. Back of this another wall was built and the 
interior space filled with earth, and this was continued until 
the top of the mountain was reached. When the work was 
completed the side of the hill presented the appearance of 
a giant stairway. On the level spaces trees and vines were 
planted, and that it must have presented a beautiful ap- 
pearance when under a full state of cultivation is attested 
by the clumps of olive trees still clinging to the earth and 
rocks on the terraces. But the walls have been broken 



* "The Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway," Scribiief s Magazine, Dr. Selah Merrill, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



499 



down. The trees were destroyed by the Romans, the 
heavy rains carried the earth down into the valleys and the 
old Judean hills are barren and desolate. 

Along the valleys and on the hillsides wherever a 
patch of earth remains the grass grows very rank, showing 
the natural fertility of the soil. The shepherd leads his 
flock from the valley to the hilltop, so that every bunch of 
green grass is utilized for pasture. One cannot see a shep- 
herd leading his flock in Palestine without bringing to 
mind the numerous Scriptural allusions to the shepherd 
and his flock. The shepherds of to-day are much the same 
as were the shepherds of Christ's time. When he said, "I 
am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known 
of mine," he used an illustration with which his disciples 
were familiar; and how well the following language is un- 
derstood in Palestine: "He calleth his own sheep by name, 
and leadeth them out. And when he putteth forth his own 
sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for 
they know his voice. And a stranger will they not follow, 
but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of 
strangers."* In our wanderings in Palestine we have seen 
the shepherds lead their flocks among the hills which en- 
compass Jerusalem on every side, on the plains about Beth- 
lehem, in the valley of Jordan, along the shores of the Sea 
of Galilee, over Hermon and Lebanon and by the waters of 
Abana and Pharpar, and they always went before and 
called their sheep by name, and the sheep, familiar with 
voice and name, followed their leaders. Once in the valley 
south of Jerusalem we saw a shepherd leading his flock and 
we called to the sheep, but they recognized not the voice of 
the stranger and fled away affrighted. 

* John 10: 3-5. 



^00 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The shepherd goes before and leads the way, and sees 
that the ground is safe and secure. There is something 
strikingly beautiful and assuring in the language of the first 
verses of the twenty-third Psalm, and it is not a fancy of 
the imagination; it is a simple fact, both as to the custom 
to which David alludes and the care of the Lord for his 
people: ''The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He 
maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me 
beside the still waters."* Could language be more tender, 
or beautiful? Then to see the shepherd leading his flock 
with tender care to the pastures and to the water brooks 
makes the language all the more real and gives the entire 
figure an intensified meaning. 

The prophet Isaiah also refers to the good shepherd 
in this beautiful language: "He shall feed his flock like a 
shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry 
them in his bosom."f And Micah says: "Feed thy people 
with thy rod, the flock of thine heritage."! As a rule the 
shepherd does not need to feed his flock, but late in the 
fall, when the pastures are dried up, this becomes necessa- 
ry. The shepherd carries a rod or staff when he leads his 
flock forth to the pastures to feed them. With it he guides 
his flock and defends them from their enemies. The staff 
and rod David refers to when he says, "Thy rod and thy 
staff they comfort me."§ Thomson says of the shepherds 
of Palestine that they are armed in order to defend their 
charges and are very courageous. Many adventures with 
wild beasts, not unlike that recounted by David, occur; and 
though there are now no lions here, wolves, leopards and 



* Ps. 23: 1, 2. 
t Isa. 40: 11. 
% Micah 7: 14- 
§ Ps. 23: 4- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



501 



panthers still prowl about these wild valleys.* They not 
unfrequently attack the flock in the very presence of the 
shepherd. I have listened with interest to their descrip- 
tions of desperate fights with those savage beasts. And 
when the thief and robber come, and come they do, the 
faithful shepherd has often to defend his flock at the haz- 
ard of his life. "The shepherd giveth his life for his 
sheep. "f 

No animals are more helpless than sheep that have 
strayed away from the flock; they become utterly bewil- 
dered, for they seem to have no sense or knowledge of lo- 
cality and are without the instinct that leads other animals 
from a strange place to their homes. This peculiarity 
seems to be implied in the prayer and confession of the 
Psalmist: "I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek thy 
servant.''^ And so the shepherd in the parable leaves "the 
ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh 
that which is gone astray,"§ for he well knows that the 
poor wanderer will never find the way back by any skill of 
its own. || 

Leaving Bittir and the shepherd and his flock, we fol- 
low the Valley of Roses, so called because of the great 
quantity of these beautiful flowers which are raised here. 
The valley is well watered by three springs which send 
forth a copious supply of fresh, sweet water and are of im- 
mense value to the land. One sees here and at many other 
places in Palestine evidences of the fact that the land 
" drinketh water of the rain of heaven. "^f 

* 1 Sam. 17: 34-37. 
t John 10: 11. 
t Ps. 119: 176. 
§Matt. 18: 12. 

|| "The Land and the Book," pages 594, 595. 
TTDeut. 11: 11. 



^02 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Within two miles of Jerusalem the road enters the val- 
ley of Rephaim which is only a continuation of the Valley 
of Roses, widened out as we approach the Holy City. 
Through the valley of Rephaim ran the boundary line be- 
tween Judah and Benjamin,* and here it is called the Val- 
ley of the Giants. This name was given it because of the 
aboriginal inhabitants who dwelt in the valley. Here in 
the broad valley of Rephaim the Philistines often en- 
camped, and here it was that they were signally defeated 
by David. "The Philistines also came up and spread 
themselves in the valley of Rephaim. "f David enquired of 
the Lord as to whether he should attack his enemy, and re- 
ceiving a favorable answer he fell upon them and smote 
them and said, "The Lord hath broken forth upon mine en- 
emies before me, as the breach of waters." The first defeat 
did not satisfy the ancient enemies, for they came up again 
and spread themselves in the valley of Rephaim, and again 
David defeated them, driving them down the valley past 
Bittir until "thou come to Gazer," J a distance of some 
twenty-five miles. 

On the west side of the plain or valley of Rephaim are 
the heaps of stone known as the Seven Ruins. Of these 
heaps Dr. Merrill says: "No one knows who placed them 
there, and the imagination gives them an exaggerated im- 
portance. The practical explanation of their existence is 
in the tradition that the plain of Rephaim was once covered 
with gardens, of which there is now no possible trace, and 
that these stones were gathered from the soil, that its culti- 
vation might be more complete and perfect. These hills 
the railroad company have purchased, laid a track to them, 



* Josh. 15: 8. 
f2Sam. 5: 18. 
%7. Sam. 5:25. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 5O3 

and are using the small stones of which they are entirely 
composed to bed down their main track. How accommo- 
dating the old inhabitants were to place these millions of 
cubic feet of stones just where they would be most conven- 
ient for use in these modern times." 

We have crossed the plain of Rephaim, the whistle 
sounds out over the hills of Judea, the conductor shouts, 
"Je-ru-sa-lem," as we pull up to a neat new station built of 
stone, and we are at the end of our first railroad journey in 
Palestine. The station is one mile from the city in a south- 
westerly direction. The trip from Jaffa has been made in 
four hours and has been delightfully pleasant and full of 
interest. The Elder and the writer are soon seated in a 
carriage provided by our excellent dragoman, Dimitrie N. 
Tadros, and being driven out upon the road leading from 
Jerusalem to Hebron. Then, turning northward, with the 
new city and the walls of the old in full view, we cross over 
the valley at Hinnom, the lower pool of Gihon to our left, 
and in a few minutes reach the Jaffa Gate. The sun is just 
tipping the western hills of Judea as we enter the gate, and 
see just within the walls a new hotel in which we find most 
comfortable quarters. It was our home during our tempo- 
rary stay in Jerusalem, and we found it in every respect a 
most comfortable home indeed. 

We could not help contrasting this with our previous 
visit to Jerusalem. We then rode from Jaffa in heavy, jolt- 
ing wagons over a miserably rough road, and in order to 
break the monotony of the journey we walked a good part 
of the way. W 7 e came up to the walls at midnight, and we 
then wrote, "In a few minutes our wagons halt at a high 
tower in the wall. We are soon on the ground and enter- 
ing the Jaffa Gate. We are in Jerusalem. Travelers have 
written many pages describing their emotions upon first 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

viewing and entering the city of cities. Shivering with 
cold and the dampness of our clothing, we do not feel in a 
mood to meditate. We hurry to our hotel, where a cold 
reception awaits us. There is no fire in the house, and at 
midnight we go shivering to our beds, in rooms with stone 
floors, that have something of the appearance of prison 
cells."* And that was only nine years ago. As we sit in 
the large reception room of the New Hotel before a blazing 
fire, for the evening is chilly, surrounded by all the com- 
forts of a first-class hotel at home, we can scarcely realize 
that we are in Jerusalem. Surely a great change has taken 
place in the City of David. 

* " Europe and Bible Lands," page 242. 



y 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 



% 

Jerusalem from Mount of Olives.— Walks about the Holy City —The 
Jaffa Gate.— Scriptural Allusions.— Abraham.— Boaz. —Slaying of 
Abner in the Gate. — Eli. — Absalom s Rebellion.— David 's Great 
Sorrow. — The Gate a Symbol of Power.— Our Beggars. — Street 
Scene in Jerusalem.— The Minaret.— Praying Moslems— A Mixed 
Multitude.— Lentiles.— Wine and Water Bottles.— The Milk Seller. 

" Glorious things of thee are spoken, 
Zion! City of our God." 

* j fft- HE first sight of Jerusalem is apt to be disappointing 
"^§| to tne traveler, and especially is this true if he ap- 

p proach from the north, south or west. From the 
east, however, the view is very fine and inspiring. Here 
one catches the first sight of the place from the Mount of 
Olives, and the Holy City is spread out in a grand pano- 
ramic view, most beautiful and impressive to look upon. 
There is no other equal to it in the world. 

Our artist gives us a photograph of this view of Jerusa- 
lem, which is here reproduced. It was taken on the side of 
Mount Olivet, above and beyond the Garden of Gethsem- 
ane, just in the rear of the new Greek church, the peculiar 
shaped roof and spires of which form the foreground of the 
picture. The eastern wall of the city and the Golden Gate, 
centrally located, with the Moslem cemetery in front, are 
all plainly shown. To the left in the view is a large dome- 
shaped building. It is the Mosque of Omar, a Mohamme- 
dan church, and occupies a place on Mount Moriah not far 
from, if not on, the very spot where Solomon's Temple 

once stood. The buildings west of the mosque are on Mt. 

505 



c- 5 wanderings in bible lands. 

Zion, the site of the Wise King's palace. The pathway 
seen 'in the picture leads down into the valley of Jehosha- 
phat, crosses the brook Kidron and intersects the road to 
Bethany. The observer, of course, overlooks the deep val- 
ley which is only partly shown in the photograph. The 
view is an excellent one, and if any of our readers should 
visit the Holy City and climb the Mount of Olives, they 
will recognize how true the picture is to the real. 

It is not our purpose to give a detailed account of Je- 
rusalem. This we have already done in a previous vol- 
ume* We shall content ourselves with sketches of our 
walks about the City of David. Volumes have been writ- 
ten, and volumes will be written, without number, descrip- 
tive of the Holy City, and yet the subject is still fresh and 
new. It is an inexhaustible mine of interest. Here, within 
and about the compass of these walls, only two and a half 
miles in extent, occurred events which have changed the 
history of the world. From amid these hills round about 
Zion have gone forth influences that have wrought greater 
and deeper changes upon the human race than can be fath- 
omed by the finite mind. We know something of the one 
supreme event connected with the history of this old city, 
but we shall only know its full significance and its mystery 
when we shall have passed the portals of the grave. It is 
because of these influences and the deep hold they have 
upon the human heart that so much interest is taken in Je- 
rusalem and its surroundings. 

But to our walks, and let the first one be to the gates 
of the city The New Hotel, our Jerusalem home, stands 
within a stone's throw of the Jaffa Gate, the principal en- 
trance and thoroughfare of the Holy City. Many times we 
passed in and out at the Jaffa Gate, at morning, noon and 

* " Europe and Bible Lands," 1&84. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 509 

night. We have walked, stood and sat in the gate. We 
have gone there to study the Scriptural allusions to the 
gates of the city and have seen how clearly the conditions, 
even to-day, after so many changes have been made, agree 
with the Bible language. Then, too, it has been a source 
of never-failing interest to take a stand near the gate and 
watch those who come in and go out. Here at the Jaffa 
Gate one may stand or sit an hour or two during the busy 
part of the day and see people coming and going from 
about every part of the Christian and Mohammedan world, 
to say nothing of the Jews who come from the four quar- 
ters of the globe. 

The Jaffa Gate stands near the northwest angle of the 
walls and within a short distance of the Tower of David. 
It is a castle-like tower built in connection with the walls 
of the city and is some forty feet high and nearly as many 
square. The top of the tower serves as a lookout for the 
watchman, and in the upper part a chamber was originally 
built which was reached by a flight of stairs. Entering the 
gate, a turn at right angles must be made before one gets 
through. In fact there are two gates, one into the tower, 
the other from the tower into the city; a plan adopted in 
the construction of the gates to assist in the defense of the 
place. The doorways are twelve feet wide and sixteen 
high. Within the tower is a considerable space arched 
overhead where one may stand or sit at pleasure. It is a 
cool, shady place, and is something of a resort for the peo- 
ple of the city. The heavy, iron-plated doors were former- 
ly closed at sundown, but now stand wide open day and 
night, and the inhabitants come and go at will. Even the 
Turkish soldier who once guarded the gateway is no more 
on duty. 



^ I0 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

While we are standing in the gate or, rather, between 
"the gates," let us look at some of the Scriptural references 
that bear directly upon this subject. We shall find many 
of them, for the Bible refers to the gates of the city, both 
literally and figuratively, a- great number of times. In the 
olden time the gate of the city was a place where assem- 
blies were held, judgment rendered, and contracts con- 
cluded and witnessed. Jerome says that, as the Jews were 
for the most part engaged in laboring in the field, it was 
wisely arranged that assemblies should be held at the city 
gates, and that justice should be administered there, so that 
the laboring men who were busy at their work might lose 
no time, and that the country people who had affairs on 
their hands to settle might find the judges at the gates, in- 
stead of going into the city. 

When Abraham was bowed down with grief by the 
death of his beloved wife Sarah, he communed with the 
children of Heth and bargained with them for the cave of 
Machpelah where he might bury his dead out of his sight. 
The sum of money to be paid was agreed upon, and the 
silver weighed out, but the contract was not fully complet- 
ed until all was "made sure unto Abraham for a possession 
in the presence of the children of Heth, before all that 
went in at the gate of his city."* So also Boaz, when he 
arranged for the marriage of Ruth, the beautiful Moabitess, 
went up to the gate of the city "and sat him down there." 
Then he called to him ten elders of the city and said to 
them, "Sit ye down here. And they sat down." And be- 
fore these judges and the witnesses before the gate he 
bought the parcel of land which belonged to Elimelech 
and with the inheritance came also the hand of the fair 
widow Ruth. The bargain was made and Boaz called upon 

*Gen. 23: 17, 18. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 5 1 1 

them to witness what had been done: " And all the people 
that were in the gate, and the eiders, said, We are wit- 
nesses."* 

The gate of the city was also the scene of sorrow and 
bloodshed. Here in this open space where we are now 
standing Joab took Abner aside as if he would speak to 
him privately, "and smote him thereunder the fifth rib, that 
he died."f It must have been in the open space at the en- 
trance of the gate that Eli sat waiting anxiously with trem- 
bling heart, fearing lest the battle should go against Israel 
and the ark of God be taken; and when the news of defeat 
came and his worst fears were realized, "he fell from off 
the seat backward by the side of the gate, and his neck 
broke, and he died. "J And yonder "beside the way of the 
gate" stood David's handsome but rebellious son, and as 
the people came and went, as they are coming and going 
now, he spoke to them courteously, and when any came 
near to bow to him he took them by the hand, greeted 
them cordially and kissed them, and thus he "stole the 
hearts of the men of Israel. "§ 

The story of the rebellion of Absalom is one of the 
most pathetic in the Old Testament. The closing scene of 
the tragedy was enacted in the gate of the city, when the 
news of the death of his boy came with such crushing force 
upon King David. Standing in the gate we can see how 
natural the whole story is. There by the side of the gate 
stood the king, as the people came out by hundreds and by 
thousands to go to the battle against Absalom, and all the 
people heard the appeal that came from the father heart, 
" Deal gently for my sake with the young man, even with 

* Ruth 4: 1-12. 
t 2 Sam. 3: 27. 
t 1 Sam. 4: 18. 
§ 2 Sam. IS: 6. 



512 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Absalom."* Then came the long, weary day of watching 
and waiting for news of the battle. "And David sat be- 
tween the two gates," that is, here between the inner and 
outer gate where he was protected from the rays of the sun, 
and the watchman stood on top of the tower and looking 
out over the plain caught sight of a man running alone, and 
he cried out and told the king. Then came the messenger, 
and the first question that came from the anxious heart of 
the father was, "Is the young man Absalom safe?" The 
messenger turned aside unable to answer the question. 
Then came the second runner Cushi, and again came the 
question, "Is the young man Absalom safe?" The blunt 
Cushi broke the news in a few words: "The enemies of my 
lord the king, and all that rise against thee to do thee hurt, 
be as that young man is." Then the king knew that his 
wayward, rebellious boy was dead. He cared to hear no 
more. What was the victory to him,— the son he loved was 
dead. He turned away, and "went up to the chamber that 
was over the gate, and wept." Here he might hide his 
face, and the cry of anguish that was wrung from his bro- 
ken heart as he went up has been echoed by millions of 
heart-broken fathers and mothers over wayward sons and 
daughters since these words burst from the lips of King 
David: "O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! 
would God I had died for thee. O Absalom, my son, my 
son!"f 

The gates of the city were built very strong and forti- 
fied in every possible way. In the strength of the gates the 
people trusted for safety, and from the top of the towers 
and from the chamber above the gate, where soldiers were 
stationed, the archers discharged volleys of arrows at their 

*2Sam. 18: 5. 
f 2 Sam. 18: 33. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. ^3 

enemies. Because of the strength of the gate the word be- 
came the symbol of power and dominion. In this sense the 
word is used many times in the Bible, as, for example, in 
the promise made to Abraham that his seed should possess 
the gates of his enemies.* The Savior also gives the word 
this same meaning when he tells his disciples that "upon 
this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall 
not prevail against it."f 

Of a different character is the allusion made by the 
Savior to the strait gate and narrow way. J The language 
does not ap_ply to the Jaffa Gate where we are now stand- 
ing, for it is wide and multitudes are going in and out; but 
it does apply to some of the gates of the city. Dr. Thomas 
says: "I have seen these strait gates and narrow ways with 
here and there a traveler. They are in the retired corners, 
and must be sought for, and are opened only to those who 
knock; and when the sun goes down and the night comes 
on, they are shut and locked. It is then too late."§ 

Thus we might sit here in the gate of the city'and call 
up one Bible allusion after another, all of which are so 
clearly illustrated in the conditions found here to-day. It 
would be pleasant and interesting to do so, and a small vol- 
ume might be written, and yet the subject would not be ex- 
hausted; but we leave the gate and enter the city. 

Just inside the Jaffa Gate is a broad way or street, on 
one side of which stands the New Hotel, while the other 
side is lined with shops of various kinds. Among others 
are several baker shops. In our walks about the city we 
found three beggars or, rather, they found us. Two half- 
grown boys nearly naked (indeed the few rags they wore 



* Gen. 22: 17. 
t Matt. 16: 18 
t Matt. 7: 14. 
§ Luke 13: 25. 



514 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

only made their nakedness the more apparent), and a poor, 
miserable cripple who hobbled along on crutches composed 
the trio. We met them near the Jaffa Gate on our first 
walk through the city. They soon made us understand 
what they wanted. Pointing to the shops where bread was 
sold and then laying their hands on that portion of the 
body where the pangs of hunger are the most keenly felt, 
they gave such a pitiful look out of their hungry eyes that 
we at once crossed the street with them and bought them a 
supply of bread. It was well worth the money spent to see 
them eat. Every morning after this, during our stay of 
some weeks in the city, our three beggars waited for us at 
the hotel door, and as regularly were they supplied with 
bread. They had picked up a few words of English, 
French and Italian, and they usually greeted us with a jum- 
ble of these words: " Good morning, Signor, Madame, Bon 
jour Katera. Muskeen, Backsheesh, you please Signor, 
Madame, good-bye." They never failed to kiss our hands 
and were profuse in thanks after receiving the bread. 

Jerusalem is situated in the hill country of Judea and 
is a city of hills. In walking through the city from west to 
east one must go down from Mount Zion, which in the olden 
time was the City of David, and climb to the top of Mount 
Moriah, where was located the threshing floor of the Jeb- 
usite which David bought and turned into a place of 
worship, and where King Solomon subsequently built his 
great temple. Both these hills or mountains are now in- 
side the walls of the city. The streets are constructed with 
a view of facilitating going up hill and down, and are at 
some places so many great stairways, the steps of which 
are ten to twelve inches high and as many feet wide. 
These are paved with blocks of stone from side to side, and 
if they were kept clean they would present a pleasing ap- 




Street View in Jerusalem. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



517 



pearance. But cleanliness is unknown among the authori- 
ties of the city, and dirt and filth prevail on every side. It 
must have been the same in David's time, for he alludes to 
it when he says, "I did cast them out as dirt in the 
streets."* The streets are narrow, and when it rains walk- 
ing is anything but a pleasure. Our photogravure is a re- 
production of a street and a street scene in Jerusalem. 
The steps before referred to are plainly brought out, as well 
as the stone pavement of the street. In the group at the 
left may be seen several European ladies; the other figures 
are natives. In the distance is a high tower with a plat- 
form near the top. It is the minaret of a Mohammedan 
mosque. The minaret is to the mosque what steeples and 
belfries are to churches. Instead, however, of having a 
bell to call the people to worship, the muezzin, a Moslem 
with lusty lung power and strong of voice, attends to this 
duty. Five times a day he takes his place upon the plat- 
form at the top of the minaret and, facing east, west, 
north and south successively, calls the faithful Moslem to 
prayer. At daybreak, at sunrise, at midday, and before 
and after sunset, the voice of the muezzin may be heard 
sounding out over the city from his high station, Allah ak- 
bar ashliadu anna la ilaha UV Allah, wa Muhammedti-rrasul 
Allah hayya; alas-sala. "Allah is great; I testify that there 
is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is the prophet of Al- 
lah; come to prayer." Sometimes at midnight the solemn 
stillness of the night is broken by the call to prayer, and 
the faithful Moslem who may be awake at that hour en- 
gages in devotion. 

At the call of the muezzin the Moslem at once engages 
in prayer, be he in the street, in the field, in the shop, or in 
his house. We have watched them kneeling down and say- 



* Ps. 18: 42. 



5 18 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

ing their prayers, and they seem to be wholly absorbed in 
their devotions. They pay no attention whatever to look- 
ers-on, and as they pray seem entirely oblivious to their 
surroundings. This is the result of training and habit. 
Children are taught to pray and during their devotions 
they, like the men, seem to be entirely isolated from their 
surroundings. Dr. Thomson says: "There is certainly an 
air of great solemnity in their mode of worship and, when 
performed by a large assembly in the mosques, or by a de- 
tachment of soldiers in concert, guided in the movements 
of their bodies by an iman or Dervish, chanting the service, 
it is quite impressive. I have seen it enacted by moon- 
light, on the wild banks of the Orontes, in the plain of Ha- 
math, and the scene was something more than romantic. 
But, alas! it was by as villainous a set of robbers as could 
be found even in that lawless region." 

The peculiar attitudes assumed in prayer by the Mos- 
lems often attracted our attention and are rather interest- 
ing. The shoes or sandals are removed from the feet, and 
among the wealthy a rug is spread upon the floor or 
ground. The next care is to turn the face toward Mecca, 
the birthplace of Mohammed. This custom was borrowed 
from the Jews. Daniel kneeled before the open window in 
his chamber toward Jerusalem "three times a day, and 
prayed and gave thanks before his God."* After securing 
a correct position the devotee raises the open hands until 
the thumbs nearly touch the ear, repeating at the same 
time the words, Allah ku akbar, ''God is most great." 
The hands are next folded together across the waist, and 
the first chapter of the Koran is recited. The hands are 
next placed on the knees and the body bent forward. 
This is repeated, and then dropping upon the knees the 

* Dan. 6: 10. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



519 



body is bent forward until the forehead touches the ground 
between the extended hands. This is repeated three times, 
and while these movements are going on short portions of 
the Koran are mumbled over, and the statement is made 
over and over again that thgre is but one God and Moham- 
med is his prophet. This finishes the prayer. The Mos- 
lem rises and goes about his work again, ready to repeat 
the performance at the next call of the muezzin. 

If much praying made people good, then the Moslems 
would stand high in piety and virtue. Unfortunately in his 
case the opposite is true. He will rise from his prayers 
and steal, lie, and cheat as if these were virtues instead of 
vices. Of course there are exceptions, but the exceptions 
are so rare that they exemplify the rule. 

Walking through these ancient streets one sees people 
from almost every nation under the sun. Here are pilgrims 
from the cold regions of the north and from equatorial Af- 
rica. The Western World is well represented, and the 
Orient sends in a full quota of pilgrims with their peculia'r 
costumes and singular habits. Not only are professing 
Christians attracted to Jerusalem and make pilgrimages 
hither, but here are devout and pious Jews from all quarters 
of the globe, who come hoping against hope that the deliv- 
erer will come and that the throne of their ancient city will 
be again restored to the house of David. They come here 
to weep and pray over the desolation of their beloved Zion, 
and surely they have cause for weeping. And then the 
Moslem considers a pilgrimage to the Mosque of Omar a 
pious undertaking, second only to going to Mecca itself, 
for which he is sure to be rewarded; and so he may be seen 
on the temple platform scowling at every Christian who 
crosses the sacred ground, or praying in some of the many 



jj 2 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

open spaces about what was once the court of Solomon's 
Temple. 

In a single day's walk through the streets of the city 
and about its walls we met nearly a score of representatives 
of the different nations of the earth. Here is a band of 
Russian pilgrims, men and women who are returning from 
the Jordan. They have made the journey on foot and are 
dusty and travel-stained. Their homes are in the cold re- 
gions of northern Europe and they wear the heavy woollen 
and fur clothing, with the fur boots of that northern cli- 
mate. They are low in stature, are heavy set, and their 
thick clothing gives them a dumpy appearance. The men 
wear full beards and the hair falls down upon the should- 
ers. They present a striking appearance as they trudge 
along, each with a pilgrim's staff in hand. 

And here we have the other extreme— pilgrims from 
Abyssinia. They are clad in light, scanty garments, which 
here are scarcely sufficient to keep them warm, but are 
more than they have need of under the tropical sun where 
their lot in life is cast. They come here to see and to wor- 
ship. The religious instinct in them is strong and it finds 
expression in the long, weary pilgrimage they have made 
to visit Jerusalem. A journey of this kind to these people 
means self-sacrifice and hardship. It is by no means a 
pleasure trip. While we admire their zeal we pity their ig- 
norance. 

The Jews one meets everywhere except on the temple 
platform, where they are forbidden to go. In recent years 
their number has largely increased here by immigration. 
Just now an order is in force from the Sultan, forbidding 
Jews to land in Palestine. As you meet them in the streets 
and on the highway you may know them by the Jewish 
type of face, by their long, black robes and caps trimmed 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS, 



with fur. Years of oppression and persecution have left 
their stamp upon the faces of these people. There is a 
look of sadness about them that appeals to the heart of the 
sympathetic. 

Here is a group of Beduins from beyond the Jordan, 
robbers every one of them, but a wholesome dread of the 
law restrains them. But woe to the luckless traveler who 
enters their territory without a sufficient guard. The fate 
of the man who went down to Jericho and fell among 
thieves awaits him. With these are native Arabs, men and 
women, the dwellers in the villages around about Jerusa- 
lem, with the Bethlehemites, a distinct class. Then there is 
a mixture of Copts and Armenians from the East, Greeks 
and Moslems from various parts of Asia Minor, Egyptians 
and Nubians from the banks of the Nile, Persians and Mes- 
opotamians from the Tigris and Euphrates, Turkish 
soldiers quartered in the Tower of David, with English, 
German, French, Austrian, Italian, Spanish and, last but by 
no means least, American representatives. One might 
search a long time and not find a better school in which to 
study various specimens of the human race than may be 
found in Jerusalem during the season of the year when the 
pilgrimages are made, say from February to May. 

The bazaars and shops in the city are by no means 
equal to those of Cairo or Damascus, and yet we may pass 
some time not without profit among the tradespeople on 
the business streets. Here all the products of the country 
are exposed for sale, and here, too, the money changers do 
a thriving business. It is to be presumed that in character 
they do not essentially differ from the same class who were 
driven from the temple by our Savior.* 

In the grain market we saw the red and yellow lentiles 

* John 2: 14. 



522 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

which are common both here arid in Egypt. A quantity of 
these were purchased, and a test will be made as to wheth- 
er they will grow on the prairies of Illinois. The lentil is a 
small pea a fourth of an inch in diameter, of an oval shape, 
convex on both sides. A thin, brownish hull covers the 
kernel. When stewed and properly seasoned the lentiles 
have an appetizing fragrance, tempting to a hungry person. 
It was from these red lentiles that Jacob made the mess of 
savory pottage that tempted the hungry Esau, and he ex- 
claimed, "Feed me with that same red pottage." Jacob 
saw his opportunity, and, with that shrewdness which has 
since characterized his descendants, drove a sharp bar- 
gain. "Sell me this day thy birthright," and his weak, 
careless brother was easily overreached. The contract was 
made and sealed by an oath, "And Jacob gave Esau bread 
and pottage of lentils. . . . And he sold his birthright 
to Jacob."* 

The plant of the lentiles, as we have seen them growing 
both in Palestine and Egypt, attains to a height of about 
one foot. It resembles the pea-vine in some respects, the 
leaves being longer and narrower. The blossoms are pur- 
ple in color, and come out in clusters. These are followed 
by the pod which is flat and contains a number of the 
small peas. When ripe the lentiles are pulled and taken to 
the threshing-floor, where they are threshed and winnowed 
like wheat. They form, an important article of food in Pal- 
estine. They are stewed as before described, and are also 
ground and mixed with wheat or barley flour and made in- 
to bread. Ezekiel refers to this when he says, "Take thou 
also unto thee wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentiles, . 

and put them in one vessel, and make thee bread 

thereof. "f 



*Gen. 25: 30-34- 
t Ezek. 4: 9- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



523 



Not far from the grain market is a little shop in which 
a workman carries on the business of mending wine and 
water bottles. The shop is quite open to the street and 
about the man are piled up "wine bottles, old and rent, 
and bound up."* Just now he is busy patching and sewing 
up a rent in an old, bursted bottle which, from its looks, 
had been in his hands for repairs before. Such a collection 
of bottles as this the Gibeonites must have made when 
they so easily deceived Joshua, and secured from him by 
craft a league and covenant of peace. "And these bottles 
of wine," said they, "which we filled were new; and, now, 
behold, they be rent."f 

Then, too, we recall at once the Savior's language as 
we stand before the bottle-mender's shop: "And no man 
putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will 
burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall per- 
ish. But new wine must be put into new bottles; and both 
are preserved." J Here one can see the full force of the il- 
lustration, for who would think of using one of these old 
bottles for wine? The bottles arc the skins of goats 
stripped from the body with as little cutting as possible. 
The neck of the animal forms the mouth of the bottle. 
New wine always ferments and expands, and when put into 
a new bottle, which is strong and elastic and stretches as 
the wine ferments, it is saved; but if put into one of these 
old wine skins, which is no longer elastic but hard and brit- 
tle, the bottle bursts, and wine and bottle both perish. 
How natural the illustration is when seen in the light 
thrown upon it here at this little shop with the old wine 
bottles. 



* Josh. 9: 4. 
fjosh. 9: 13 
JLuke 5:37, 38. 



IJ24 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

The skin bottle also serves the purpose of a churn. The 
cream is put into it and it is then suspended, often from the 
branch of a tree where it is shaken and twisted, pounded 
and kneaded, until the butter comes. It is then taken out, 
boiled, and put into goat skins for use. It is like oil and is 
the only kind of butter the natives have. Of the churn and 
churning Dr. Thomson says: "I suppose they made butter 
in much the same way in olden times. Solomon says: 
' Surely the churning of milk bringeth forth butter, and the 
wringing of the nose bringeth forth blood.'* But the word 
for churning and wringing is the same in Hebrew. It is 
the wringing of milk that bringeth forth butter, just as 
these women are squeezing and wringing the milk in that 
skin bottle. There is no analogy between our mode of 
churning, and pulling a man's nose until the blood comes; 
but in this native operation the comparison is quite natural 

and emphatic. "f 

The skin of the kid is carefully prepared and made in- 
to bottles in which milk is carried and sold in the streets of 
the city. Leaving the bottle-mender's shop, carrying with 
us one of the old wine bottles, on the way to our hotel we 
pass a milkmaid. She carries the kid skin with the milk 
in it in a basket on her head. Finding a customer she sets 
the basket on the ground and squats beside it. Then she 
places the measure near the basket, takes hold of the 
neck of the bottle with one hand and, pressing on the skin 
with the other, causes the milk to flow into the cup. So 
skillfully is this done that not a drop of the milk is wasted. 
The skill manifested in filling the measure is the only thing 
attractive about the milkmaid. Her hands and face are 
covered with dirt, and the skin bottle is in the same condi- 
tion, and we are glad that with us milk is not one of the ne- 
cessities of life. 

* Prov. 30: 33- 

t " The Land and the Book," page 456. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

A Quiet Lord's Day. — The Last Supper. — Gethsemane. — Mount of 
Olives. — Meditation. — David s Sorrow. — Solomon s Builders. — 
Captivity. — The Triumphant Entry into Jerusalem. — The Agony. 
— The Shadow of the Cross. — Abide with Me. 

HERE are some impressions made upon the mind 
that are more lasting than others, some memories 
that cling to us while others vanish away and are 
forgotten. These may result from some deep sor- 
row that covers the soul as the flood of many waters, the 
shadow of which follows us all along our pathway, casting 
a sombre hue over every landscape and giving an under- 
tone of sadness to all that is left of life to us; or they may 
come from a great joy filling the soul and thrilling the 
whole being with an ecstasy of gladness never to be forgot- 
ten; or from that peace which flows into the heart when we 
are alone with God enjoying sweet communion with our 
Creator, a peace that passeth all understanding and leaves 
an impress upon the heart and soul that will stay with us 
even as we enter the valley and shadow of death. Be the 
causes what they may, such events occur and stand out 
prominently in our life experiences. From them we date 
the lesser and more commonplace happenings, so that they 
become milestones telling off the journey of life. One of 
these events in my own life was a Sabbath Day's journey 
from Jerusalem to Bethany, stopping by the way at the 
Garden of Gethsemane and spending hours in Bible read- 
ing, meditation and prayer on the slopes of Olivet. 
525 




526 WANDERINGS- IN BIBLE LANDS. 

In this never-to-be-forgotten walk about the Holy City 
my purpose was to follow, as nearly as I might, the foot- 
steps of our Master on the night of his betrayal. 

It is now conceded by all who have studied the subject 
that the supper recorded in the thirteenth chapter of St. 
John was eaten at Jerusalem the evening before the day of 
the crucifixion. Tradition, which has been so busy looking 
after the holy places here, points out the place where this 
important event occurred, but it is without historic basis. 
The traditional upper room is just outside the Zion Gate on 
Zion's Hill, but as there can be no certainty as to its au- 
thenticity, we may leave it without further notice. We do 
know that somewhere in the city, probably on Mount Zion, 
the Lord gathered his disciples and ate his last sad meal 
with them. The ..shadow of the cross was now upon him, 
and after the supper the sorrowing company threaded their 
way through the dark streets of the city. Emerging at one 
of the gates on the eastern side, they descended into the 
deep valley of Jehoshaphat, crossed the Kidron and sought 
seclusion beneath the olive trees in the Garden of Geth- 
semane. 

There is something inexpressibly tender and touching 
thrown about the scene of that last supper. It was the last 
meeting between Master and disciples. It was here that 
the purpose of the betrayer was made manifest. It was 
here that the last lessons were given and the ordinances in- 
stituted that have come down to us from the Master. It 
was here, too, that the Lord showed his great love for his 
own and taught the lesson of humility. " Having loved his 
own which were in the world, he loved them unto the 
end."* As they were seated at the table came the crown- 
ing act of humility. The Son of God "riseth from supper," 

* John IV- I. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 527 

girds himself with a towel, pours water into a basin and 
washes and wipes the feet of his disciples. What wonder- 
ful condescension! The objection of the impulsive Peter 
was met in such a way that his willingness carried him far 
beyond what was necessary, "Not my feet only, but also 
my hands and my head." After this was given the com- 
mand, so strongly worded and so often disregarded, "If 
I then your Lord and Master have washed your feet; ye 
also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given 
you an example, that ye should do as I have done to 
you."* And then the promised reward for obedience was 
also given: "If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do 
them."f 

After these things came the touching farewell words, 
that last address, and the new commandment which the 
Master gave his followers, making it at the same time the 
supreme test of discipleship: "A new commandment I give 
unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, 
that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know 
that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." J 
Then they sang a hymn, the music and sentiment of which 
must have been full of tender pathos, and went out, and it 
was night. The paschal moon was shining above the brow 
of Olivet, casting dark shadows over hill and valley as the 
Son of God, with his eleven followers, threaded his way 
through the dark, narrow streets of the City of David. It 
was a sad company. The cup of sorrow, which was to be 
drained to the dregs on the morrow, was already pressed to 
the lips of our dear Savior. Silently they passed through 
the crty and then, going down the steep hillside, they came 

* John 13: 14, 1$. 
t John 13: 17. 
John 13: 34. 35- 



1-28 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

to the flowing brook of Kidron. Here it was that he told 
his disciples that the Shepherd should be smitten and the 
sheep scattered, and Peter vehemently protested that he 
would not deny him in any wise, even if he should die with 
him. Then they crossed over the brook, walked up the 
slope of Olivet and entered the Garden of Gethsemane. 

There are times in our lives when we love to be alone, 
when the presence of our dearest friends is not desired. 
At such times it is pleasant to wander away from the busy 
throng to some quiet place, where the solitude is unbroken, 
and spend the hours in meditation and prayer, holding 
sweet communion in spirit with God. So I felt when I 
started out from our hotel to spend the Lord's Day on Oli- 
vet and at Bethany. The Elder also desired to spend the 
day alone, and so each of us went his way. 

At the door our beggars are met, and each goes his 
way with a loaf of bread. Then I walk down to the de- 
scent of the valley of Kidron, and here I know I am not far 
from the path trod by the Savior. It may be, indeed it is 
altogether likely, that he went down into the valley by this 
very pathway. How the very thought stirs the heart with 
emotions too deep and sacred for utterance! 

Just at this point outside the city wall, a short distance 
from St. Stephen's Gate, the original of the annexed photo- 
gravure was taken. It presents a beautiful view of the 
Mount of Olives as it appears to-day. In the foreground it 
will be observed that the road, after crossing Kidron, pass- 
es between two walls, and farther on it forks. The enclo- 
sure at the right is known as the Garden of Gethsemane and 
is to be distinguished by the tall, pointed cypress* trees 
growin- within the wall. The other trees we see growing 
in the garden and elsewhere on the mountain are olives. 
Many of them show extreme age and have stood on the 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 53 1 

slopes of the hill for many centuries. Above the garden 
and farther to the right is the new Greek church, the top of 
which is seen in the foreground of the photogravure of 
Jerusalem on page 529. To the right and rear of the 
church is the Jewish cemetery. The top of the mountain, 
it will be observed, is covered with olive trees. This is 
the traditional place from which Christ ascended, and is 
marked by a Greek church and modern mosque. The Greek 
church with the tall spire, to the left, was completed only 
a few years ago, and is a beautiful structure built of cut 
stone. The other has stood on the summit of Olivet for 
many centuries, and Christians may worship in it. Three 
roads or pathways lead over the mountain. The one to the 
left goes up to the northern height of Mount Olivet. The 
one in the center leads to the summit and to the traditional 
site of the ascension. It was doubtless by this pathway 
that David went up when he fled from his rebellious son 
Absalom. The other will be observed at the foot of the 
wall of the Garden of Gethsemane. It passes over the 
southern slope of the mountain and leads to Bethany, Jeri- 
cho, the Dead Sea and the fords of the Jordan. 

Continuing my walk, I go down the path and enter the 
roadway leading to the Garden of Gethsemane. A stone 
bridge has been thrown across the now dry bed of the 
brook of Kidron, and the road has been broadened and im- 
proved until it has become an excellent highway for wag- 
ons and carriages. Sitting by the wayside just beyond the 
bridge were a number of poor, unfortunate human beings 
afflicted with the terrible disease of leprosy. They begged 
alms of the passers-by. One of them, a poor woman with 
face and arms covered with scales and disfigured by the 
loathsome disease, came toward me begging piteously for 
help. Her voice was harsh and cracked, but her plea was 



532 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

heart-touching, "Muskeen, Leprous. Backsheesh, Howad- 
jii —I am a poor leper, give me alms, O pilgrim." The be- 
stowal of a small coin turned the piteous appeal into grate- 
ful thanks which doubtless came from the heart of the poor 
unfortunate. But the pitiful cry of the poor woman, Lep- 
rous! Leprous! sounded in my ears long after I had left her 
behind. 

Then I thought of the time when, long centuries ago, 
the dear Lord trod this same pathway and with a heart full 
of love for suffering humanity healed the lepers, restored 
sight to the blind and raised the dead. I thought of the 
poor fellow, stricken with the terrible disease, who asked 
the Master not for alms but for a gift that only divine pow- 
er could bestow. How trembling between hope and fear he 
said, "Lord, if thou wilt thou canst make me clean." 
What faith the leper must have had in the power of the 
young prophet of Nazareth to heal him and cleanse him of 
the terrible malady that had fastened itself upon him! 
"Thou canst make me clean" was the expression of faith 
and hope which came with impassioned cry from the very 
soul of the leper. The Lord turned to the poor fellow. 
His compassionate heart was touched. He put forth his 
hand and touched him and uttered these words which must 
have thrilled every nerve of the suppliant, "I will, be thou 
clean."* 

" And lo! the scales fell from him, and his blood 
Coursed with delicious coolness through his veins, 
And his dry palms grew moist, and on his brow 
The dewy softness of an infant stole. 
His leprosy was cleansed; and he fell down 
Prostrate at Jesus' feet, and worshiped him. 
Continuing my walk I pass by the Garden of Gethsem- 
ane, the scene of Christ's great agony, and climb the steep 

* Matt. 8: 2-4. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



533 



hillside, taking the middle pathway to where the new Greek 
church stands. An accommodating attendant opens the 
door and a hurried glance is taken at the interior. But this 
is not a day for visiting churches, and the custodian seems 
surprised at the lack of interest shown in the really tasty 
and beautiful building. Beyond the church on the steep 
hillside a secluded spot is found and here, beneath the 
spreading branches of an ancient olive tree, I sit down and 
read from my Bible many of the wonderful events which 
occurred within sight of my resting-place. 

The day is wonderfully bright and clear. The sun 
shines from an unclouded sky, and the dense shade of the 
olive tree is a grateful protection from his rays. The air 
borne across the king's dale from the hills of the Holy City 
is soft and balmy. The singular clearness of the atmos- 
phere brings distant objects very close. It is just such a 
Lord's Day as I long had hoped I might have to spend 
alone on the Mount of Olives. Sitting here, how the events 
and the sacred associations of the past come crowding 
upon the mind! Within sight of this spot the greatest 
events in the history of the world occurred. As I read and 
meditate the present grows dim and the spirit of the ages 
gone comes upon me. Jerusalem is spread out before me, 
and on the hill of Zion stands the palace of King David. 
It is built of the cedars of Lebanon, and here the shepherd 
king dwells in regal splendor. But he is not a happy man. 
In days long since gone he sowed the seed, and now he is 
reaping the harvest. I see an old man, bent with age but 
still a king in appearance, coming out of the city surround- 
ed by a few faithful followers. They descend the hillside, 
cross the valley of Jehoshaphat, and climb up the steep 
side of Olivet by the very path where I am sitting. As 
they come nearer I notice that the old man is barefoot, and 



534 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

his feet are bruised and torn by the rough stones in his 
pathway, that his head is covered with sackcloth, and that 
the whole company is weeping. It is King David in his 
old age, and he is fleeing from his rebellious son Absalom. 
"And David went up by the ascent of mount Olivet, and 
wept as he went up, and had his head covered, and he went 
barefoot: and all the people that was with him covered ev- 
ery man his head, and they went up, weeping as they 
went."* The sad, sorrowing company, with the barefoot, 
broken-hearted father and king in their midst, continue 
their journey. Reaching the summit of the mountain they 
pass over the brow of the hill and are lost to sight. 

Time in its ceaseless flight rolls on and King David is 
dead and has been laid in the tomb of his fathers, and his 
wise son Solomon reigns in his stead. Yonder on Mount 
Moriah, which seems but a stone's throw from me, there is 
the excitement and bustle of thousands of men at work. 
The mountain is being encased with great heavy walls. 
The stonecutters and hewers who are hid away in the 
bowels of the mountain are cutting and squaring the great 
blocks that are to be placed in the foundation wall. For 
the king has commanded that great, costly, hewed stones 
shall be brought wherewith to lay the foundation. f And 
the seventy thousand burden bearers bring the huge blocks 
of cut stones from the quarries, and they are placed in the 
walls by "Solomon's builders and Hiram's builders." The 
walls are carried up nearly as high as the top of the moun- 
tain, and the inner space is filled up and made level. And 
now on top of the platform around about the very summit 
of Moriah the workmen lay the foundations of the temple. 
The structure rises and at last the most magnificent build- 



* 2 Sam. 13: 30. 
1 1 Kings 5.: 17. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



535 



ing the world has known rises before me. The temple is 
completed and there is great rejoicing in the city. The 
roads and paths converging at the walls of Jerusalem are 
alive with people. Israel is coming up to the dedication of 
the temple. It is a great holiday over all the land, a day of 
gladness and rejoicing. And now on the temple platform 
are gathered together with King Solomon the "elders of 
Israel," the "heads of the tribes, the chiefs of the fathers" 
of the sons of Jacob. They have in their midst the ark of 
the covenant and all the holy vessels pertaining to the 
house of the Lord. These they place in the holy and most 
holy places in the temple. At last the ark of God has 
found a resting-place; and now behold the cloud of glory 
coming down from heaven and resting upon and filling the 
temple. It is the Shekinah of God, the evidence of his 
presence with his people Israel. Then the Wise King 
kneels down in the presence of the mighty congregation 
that covers the hills and valleys around about the holy 
mountain and spreads forth his hands toward heaven and 
offers up his prayer to the God of his fathers. Sitting here 
one could hear his fervent words, "Lord God of Israel, 
there is no God like thee, in heaven above, or on earth be- 
neath, who keepeth covenant and mercy with thy servants 
that walk before thee with all their heart. . . . But will 
God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and 
heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this 
house that I have builded."* 

Another step forward and the sound of prayer and re- 
joicing gives place to the din of battle. Centuries have 
rolled away, the Wise King is dead, and his sayings have 
been gathered up and placed among the sacred books. 
The city with its beautiful temple is surrounded by a hos- 

* i Kings 8: 23, 27. 



536 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



tile foe. The dreaded Assyrian has come "down like a 
wolf on the fold," the walls of the city are broken down, 
the cries of the vanquished and dying are mingled with the 
shouts of the victors. The streets of Jerusalem are dyed 
with blood, the magnificent temple is destroyed, the Holy 
of holies is rifled and the vessels of gold, sacred to the serv- 
ice of the most high God, are borne away. Judah is car- 
ried into captivity to far-away Babylon. The glory of the 
City of David is departed; as a widow bereft of her children 
she weeps in her great desolation. And why? Because 
her children did not walk before God with a full heart to 
obey his commandments. 

Again the years roll on and a returning band of hope, 
who have not forgotten Jerusalem in their captivity, come 
back from the rivers of Babylon and commence the work of 
restoring the waste places of Zion. The walls grow under 
their hands, notwithstanding the taunts of their enemies. 
They work and pray with swords girded about them to re- 
pel the attacks of the scorners, and at last, after years of 
labor, the sound of rejoicing is again heard on Moriah and 
Zion. The walls are restored, the temple rebuilt, and a sol- 
emn dedication service is held unto the Lord. 

Another flight of centuries with their hush of silence is 
noted by the recording angels, and along yonder pathway, 
just at my feet, comes a procession from the little town of 
Bethany, the home of Lazarus, Martha and Mary, and, be- 
hold, a greater than David or Solomon is here. "Tell ye 
the daughter of Sion, Behold, thy King cometh unto thee, 
meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an 
ass."* The great multitude forming the procession covers 
all the hillside and extends far down into the valley. As 
they pass along they cast their outer garments upon the 

* Matt. zv. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



537 



ground and cut the branches from the olive and palm trees 
and strew them in the way. The great company join their 
voices in song, saying, "Hosanna to the son of David: 
Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosan- 
na in the highest."* In the very midst of the great shout- 
ing, swaying multitude, seated on a colt, is Jesus of 
Nazareth, the Savior of the world, the King of Glory in 
his humility, entering the City of David; and as he crosses 
the brook of Kidron and ascends the hill to the gate of the 
city there falls upon him a shadow. It is the shadow of 
the cross. 

And now a few more days have gone and a little com- 
pany, twelve in number, emerge from the eastern wall of 
the city, towering yonder on Moriah, and coming down the 
slope of the hill they cross the stream and enter the Garden 
of Gethsemane, lying here almost at my feet. Can it be 
possible, I ask myself, that this is the place to which the 
Master led his sorrowing disciples? Is this the spot where 
he knelt in su< h great agony and prayed until his sweat be- 
came great drc^ s of blood? Whether this enclosure be the 
true garden where the struggle took place cannot be deter- 
mined, but I do know that it was very near this spot that 
the prayer of agony was offered. "The general position of 
Gethsemane is clear; and then, as now, the gray leaves, the 
dark-brown trunks, the soft, green sward, the ravine with 
Olivet towering over it to the eastward and Jerusalem to 
the west, must have been the main external features of a 
place which must be regarded with undying interest while 
time shall be, as the place where the Savior of the world 
entered alone into the Valley of the Shadow. "f Looking 
down into and across the deep valley I can see the path- 



* Matt. 21:9. 

t Canon Farrar's " Life of Christ." 



538 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



way down which he came with the eleven. There they 
crossed the brook of Kidron and slowly ascending the hill- 
side came to Gethsemane. Here he uttered these sad 
words, "My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: 
tarry ye here, and watch with me.' 1 * And then he retired 
from them about a stone's cast and there he fell on the 
ground and prayed that the cup might pass from him, 
"And being in agony he prayed more earnestly: and his 
sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to 
the ground."f 

He left them near and went a little on, 

And in the depth of that hushed silentness, 

Alone with God, he fell upon his face, 

And as his heart was broken with the rush 

Of his surpassing agony, and death, 

Wrung to him from a dying universe, 

Was mightier than the Son of Man could bear, 

He gave his sorrows way — and in the deep 

Prostration of his soul breathed out the prayer 

" Father, if it be possible with thee, 

Let this cup pass from me." Oh, how a word, 

Like the forced drop before the fountain breaks, 

Stilleth the press of human agony! 

The Savior felt its quiet in his soul; 

And though his strength was weakness, and the light 

Which led him on till now was sorely dim, 

He breathed a new submission — " Not my will 

But thine be done, O Father! " As he spoke, 

Voices were heard in heaven, and music stole 

Out from the chambers of the vaulted sky, 

As if the stars were swept like instruments. 

No cloud was visible, but radiant wings 

Were coming with a silvery rush to earth, 

And as the Savior rose, a glorious one 

With illumined forehead, and the light 

Whose fountain is the mystery of God 

Encalmed within his eye, bowed down to him, 



* Matt. 26: 38. 
t Luke 22: 44. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 530 

And nerved him with a ministry of strength. 
It was enough — and with his godlike brow 
Re-written of his Father's messenger, 
With meekness, whose divinity is more 
Than power and glory, he returned again 
To his disciples, and awaked their sleep.* 

And now the hour has come when the power of the 
world is to prevail. Even while he speaks the words that 
awake his slumbering disciples, the sound of tramping feet 
and clashing swords is heard, and the flashing of torches in 
the darkness is seen in the garden. The betrayer kisses 
the Master who is then, taken and led away. The shadow 
of the cross grows darker and deeper as it falls upon him 
now. Only a few more hours shall pass and the terrible or- 
deal of the crucifixion will come. They lead him away 
from the garden, the brook of Kidron is crossed again, and 
very soon the multitude with their lonely prisoner disap- 
pear from sight. 

How real this all seems to me as I sit here beneath the 
olive tree within a stone's cast of where it all occurred, and 
how close it comes to me as I read over and over again the 
old pathetic story from the New Testament. Who could 
read the story of suffering and anguish without sympathy? 
The coldest heart would be touched and melted. In this 
life we all have emotions and feelings which we fail to find 
words to express. And so to-day, as I sit here and read 
and meditate and pray, my soul is stirred with emotions 
too strong for feeble words. With them comes the 
thought that Jesus bore all this for me. Yes, for me he 
bore the crown of thorns and the cross. And what am I 
that such a price should be paid for me? A sinner, saved 
only by the blood of Christ. Oh the peace that comes into 
the soul that has been washed in that fountain which 

* Willis. 



^40 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

flowed from Calvary ! And what am I doing for him who 
died for me? 

"Must Jesus bear the cross alone, 
And all the world go free ? 
No; there's a cross for every one 
And there's a cross for me." 

God help me! God help us all to bear our cross, fol- 
lowing all the way the Master trod in weariness and pain, 
even if that way leads to the place of crucifixion. For this 
we do know, if we bear the cross we shall also wear the 
crown. And if we walk in his ways he has promised to be 
with us alway, even unto the end. As we bear his cross 
may he be with us. Here on the slope of Olivet, sur- 
rounded by these sacred and hallowed associations, I make 
this my prayer: 

Abide with me! Fast falls the eventide; 
The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide! 
When other helpers fail and comforts flee, 
Help of the helpless! oh abide with me. 

Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day; 
Earth's joys grow dim; its glories pass away; 
Change and decay in all around I see; 
Oh thou who changest not, abide with me. 

I need thy presence every passing hour; 
What but thy grace can foil the tempter's power? 
Who like thyself my guide and stay can be? 
Through cloud and sunshine, oh abide with me. 

I fear no foe with thee at hand to bless; 

Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness; 

Where is death's sting? Where, grave, thy victory? 

I triumph still, if thou abide with me. 

Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes, 

Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies; 

Heaven's morning breaks and earth's vain shadows flee; 

In life, in death, O Lord! abide with me. 



CHAPTER XXX. 




"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem r — The Desolation of Palestine.— A View 
from the Top of Olivet.— The Bright Arab Boy.— The Olives.— 
Bethany.— The Death and Resurrection of Lazarus.— A Cloud not 
Larger than a Man's Hand. 

u 

NE might sit here in this quiet, shady nook on the 
side of Olivet, the most noted mountain in the 
world, and write volumes touching the Biblical al- 
lusions to places within sight, and yet utterly fail to ex- 
haust the subject, for yonder city and these hills and 
valleys have played an important part in the history of the 
world. But it is not my present purpose to allude further 
to these interesting events, unless it be to give one more il- 
lustration of this character and then continue my Sabbath 
Day's journey to Bethany. The incident is suggested by 
the magnificent view to be had of the Holy City from the 
spot where I sit. 

Jerusalem can be seen at its very best from the Mount 
of Olives, and I can very well believe that it may have 
been from a point of view like this that Jesus, coming out 
from the temple, uttered those memorable and most pa- 
thetic words concerning his love for the city and the terri- 
ble fate in store for it. % 

He had been telling the scribes and Pharisees that 
their profession was empty, hollow mockery, that their 
worship was at best a lip service, while their hearts were 
far from God, and that they were hypocrites like unto 
whited sepulchres, beautiful to look upon but inwardly full 
541 



542 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

of corruption and dead men's bones. How his words must 
have stung them to the heart, and how they must have 
hated him who thus held them up as they were. After set- 
ting them forth in their true light, in strong and scathing 
language, the strongest he used in his ministry, he looked 
out upon Jerusalem, his own city, and his compassionate 
heart was full of pity. As he beheld the place the veil 
which hides the future was turned aside, and as he saw the 
terrible fate in store for Zion, who will doubt that the Mas- 
ter wept? Then came the touching, tender words showing 
how his heart yearned toward those who had already 
rejected him and were plotting to put him to death: "O Je- 
rusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and ston- 
est them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have 
gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her 
chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your 
house is left unto you desolate. For I say unto you, Ye 
shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he 
that cometh in the name of the Lord."* And how literally 
have these prophetic words uttered in deep sorrow by the 
Master been fulfilled! " Your house shall be left unto you 
desolate." Desolation has fallen upon the City of David. 
On Mount Moriah, where stood in all its splendor the great 
temple, now stands the Mosque of Omar, a building dedi- 
cated to the worship of the false prophet, and we only need 
walk down through the narrow streets of the city to the 
Jews' wailing place to see a practical illustration of the ful- 
fillment of the prophetic words of the Lord. 

" For the palace that lies desolate, we 
Sit in solitude and mourn." 

Well may the descendants of those who rejected and 
crucified Christ, the Son of God, sit in solitude and weep 



* Matt. 23: 37-39. 




Tower of the New Greek Church on the Top of the Mount of Olives, 
Marking the Supposed Site of the Ascension. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



545 



and mourn over the desolation of palace and temple, "How 
doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is 
she become as a widow! she that was great among the na- 
tions, and princess among the provinces, how is she be- 
come tributary!"* The crown of glory has been taken 
away from Jerusalem and who shall restore her greatness? 

" The desolation of nations! there she stands 

Childless andcrownlessin her voiceless woe." 

But not only is Jerusalem desolate, but all the Land of 
Palestine has shared her fate. From Dan to Beersheba, 
from the "great sea" to the Jordan, and beyond, desolation 
tells the story. These words are written about the site of 
every city, across every hillside and valley and by the* side 
of river and sea, "Behold, your land is left unto you des- 
olate." 

Ascending the slope of Olivet still farther, we have be- 
fore us the Greek church and the mosque surrounded by 
groves of olive trees. These buildings mark the tradi- 
tional spot of the ascension. The New Testament refers to 
the place in a general way, leaving the spot from which our 
Lord ascended uncertain.f And this is well. If the exact 
spot where the great events in the life of Christ took place 
had been authoritatively pointed out, they would have be- 
come places of too sacred importance to men. The record 
is wisely silent on these things. 

Our photogravure gives a beautiful view of the top of 
Olivet. In the foreground are two very old olive trees, and 
those of our readers who have not seen trees of this kind 
will be able to form an idea of their shape and growth. To 
the right is the dome of a building, once a Christian church 
but now in possession of the Moslems, while to the left is 

* Lam. i: i. 

t Luke 24: $2; Acts 1: 9-12. 



546 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

seen the tower of the new Greek church recently con- 
structed at this place. From the upper windows of the 
tower one has the finest and, without doubt, the most inter- 
esting view in Palestine. 

Climbing to the top of the tower and looking eastward 
over the hills down into a deep depression, the valley of 
the Jordan seems to be almost at my feet. The clear, 
transparent atmosphere is nowhere else so deceptive. The 
course of the river, winding its way downward until it is 
lost forever in the mysterious waters of the Dead Sea, is 
fully in view. The blue waters of the sea seem but a few 
miles away, and yet it is some fifteen miles in a straight 
line to its shore. In that distance the hills sink away from 
where I am standing, so that the Dead Sea is three thou- 
sand, nine hundred feet below the top of the Mount of Ol- 
ives. Were it not for the fact that I had ridden down to 
Jericho, the valley of the Jordan and the sea, spending 
seven hours in the saddle and passing over barren hills and 
through many deep-cut ravines, I could scarcely believe 
that it is so far away. Beyond the valley of the Jordan 
rise the mountains of Moab, once the possession of the 
tribe of Reuben; and it is among these hills that we must 
look for Mount Pisgah where Moses stood when he looked 
over into the land which he was not permitted to enter, and 
Mount Nebo where the great lawgiver died. On a small 
eminence to the south of this range is Kerak. Here it was, 
when his capital was besieged by the Israelites, that King 
Mesha offered up on the walls of the city to the god Che- 
mosh his eldest son "who should have reigned in his 
stead."* Northward across the Jordan rises Gilead which 
once belonged to the tribe of Gad. Not far away is the 
Jabbok, where Jacob divided his flocks for fear of his 



* 2 Kings 3: 27- 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 547 

brother Esau, and Peniel where he wrestled with the angel 
of the Lord through the long hours of the night. 

Turning southward and westward the hills which fringe 
the plain of Rephaim are before me. By the roadside 
which winds away towards Bethlehem and Hebron stands 
the Monastery of St. Elias, beyond which is Bethlehem, 
where Christ was born. The place itself is scarcely visible, 
but the surrounding country is in full view, and in the val- 
ley yonder may have been the fields where the shepherds 
watched their flocks by night when the choir of heaven 
came down to earth singing, " Glory to God in the highest, 
and on earth peace, good will toward men."* Directly 
west, and at my very feet, as it seems, is the City of Jerusa- 
lem, and from this high place one can see down into the 
narrow streets. North from the Damascus Gate the rich 
olive groves spread over the country toward the long slope 
of the mountain of Samuel, the home of the prophet, the 
Mizpeh of the Bible. "And Mizpeh; for he said, The Lord 
watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from 
another." f Nebi Samwil, as the mountain is now called, 
rises two thousand, nine hundred and thirty-five feet above 
the sea level and is the highest elevation in southern Pales- 
tine. It shuts off the view to the north. Close at hand is 
the upper valley of the Kidron, bounded on the east by Mt. 
Scopus, where Titus, the Roman general, had his headquar- 
ters when he besieged and took the city. 

Coming down again from the Mount of Olives on the 
western side, I cross the Jewish cemetery where the grave- 
diggers are at work cutting shallow tombs in the stubborn 
rocks, and reach the road leading to Bethany. 

*Luke 2: 8. 
t Gen. 31:49. 



548 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Just before I left the olive grove two Arab boys came 
to me and, putting out their hands, asked for backsheesh. 
Instead of acceding to their request I put out my hand 
and repeated the word well known to them. Without a 
moment's hesitation the older boy unslung the shepherd's 
pouch which he carried on his shoulder, took out a small 
loaf of dark bread, broke off a generous portion, and 
handed it to me saying, Tyab, "Very good." I took a 
small bit of the bread, ate it and handed the boy the coin 
which I felt that his quick wit and generosity earned for 
him. It was the first and last time I ever asked an Arab 
for backsheesh. 

And now I have a delightful walk to Bethany. To my 
right and left are the olive groves from which the mountain 
takes its name, and the scene is one of great beauty. The 
olive grows no higher than the apple tree, and the narrow 
leaves are a light green on top with a tinge of white under- 
neath. Hosea doubtless had in mind a scene like this when 
he said that when Israel was restored to divine favor " his 
branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive 
tree."* Dr. Geikie has given some interesting facts con- 
cerning the olive, from which we glean. The olive was cul- 
tivated in Palestine long before the Hebrews came in to 
possess the land, for olive trees which they had not planted 
were among the good things which Moses said they shoul'd 
enjoy.t In ancient times the country was dotted every- 
where with olive groves. "Thou shalt have olive trees," 
says Moses, " through all thy coasts."! Joel promised that, 
if the people turned to their God, " the fats should over- 
flow with oil."§ The olive harvest was as important to the 



* Hosea 14: 6. 
f Deut.6: n. 
X Deut. 28: 40. 
gjoel 2:24, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 549 

Hebrew farmer as that of the vine or of corn, the three 
being often mentioned together as the great staples of na- 
tional prosperity.* It was so important in the royal reve- 
nues that King David appointed officers over stores of oil 
and his olive woods. More was raised than could be used 
for home consumption, and it was exported to Egypt and 
Phcenicia. 

The olive tree is propagated from shoots or cuttings, 
which, after they have taken root, are grafted, since other- 
wise they would grow up "wild olives" and bear inferior 
fruit. Sometimes, however, a "good olive" from some 
cause ceases to bear, and in this case a shoot of the wild 
olive — that is, one of the shoots from those which spring 
up round the trunk — is grafted into the barren tree, with 
the result that the sap of the good olive turns this wild 
shoot into a good branch, bearing fruit such as the parent 
stem should have borne. It is to this practice that Paul al- 
ludes when he says of the Gentiles, " If some of the 
branches were broken off, and thou, being a wild olive, wast 
grafted in among them, and didst become partaker with 
them of the root of the fatness of the olive tree."f And 
further, "If thou wast cut out of that which is by nature a 
wild olive tree, and wast grafted contrary to nature into a 
good olive tree: how much more shall these, which are the 
natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? "J 
Here reference is made to the Jews as God's chosen olive 
tree and the grafting of the Gentiles into the good olive 
tree. Hitherto they were wild olives, but by grafting they 
are made to yield fruit, but only from the sap and fatness 
of the old stem. The "olive tree wild by nature " can only 

* Deut. 28: 40; y. 13; n: 14; 12: 17; Joel 1: 10; 1 Chron. 27: 28; 2 Chron. 32: 28, 
tRom. 11: 17 (R: V.). 
I Rom. 11:24 (R. V.). 



550 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

mean the shoots that spring up wild and worthless from the 
roots of the old tree. Apart from these there are no wild 
olives. 

The olive tree" is long lived. It bears no fruit for ten 
years, and a half century elapses before it comes to full 
bearing. Some of these on the slopes of Olivet are more 
than a thousand years old. The olive harvest takes place 
in October. The fruit is about the size of the small damson 
plum, being oval in shape and dark green in color. The 
gathering is done by women and boys, who climb into the 
trees and shake them or stand beneath and beat the 
branches with long poles. But the olives are not all taken, 
and the poor olive gleaner may still be seen every year 
gathering what he can after the trees have been stripped by 
their owners. One seems to live in the days of Moses 
when it was said, "When thou beatest thine olive tree, thou 
shalt not go over the boughs again; it shall be for the stran- 
ger, for the fatherless, and for the widow." * Isaiah also 
refers to the same custom: "As the shaking of an olive 
tree, two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, 
four or five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof."f 

The harvest time of the olives is a season of gladness. 
Some of the fruit falls before the crop is fully ripe, but 
this must lie there until a proclamation is made by the 
governor that the trees shall be picked. This is done so 
that the taxgatherer may be on hand to exact his share, 
and this tax is so heavy that it discourages the increase of 
olive orchards. 

The olive is prepared for food by pickling, but the 
greater part of the crop is made into oil. In ancient times 
the gathered olives were either pressed or trodden by the 

* Deut. 24: 20. 
flsa. 17:6, 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 55 1 

feet in an olive vat. The finest oil, however, was that 
which flowed from the berries when merely beaten, not 
from those that were pressed; and it was the beaten oil that 
was used for religious purposes. "Thou shalt command 
the children of Israel, that they bring thee pure oil olive 
beaten for the light."* The oil vats were hewn in the 
rocks and they are still found in various parts of the coun- 
try. A vat of this kind found near the foot of Olivet gave 
its name to the Garden of Gethsemane. Along with the ■ » 
vats in which the fruit was trodden presses and mills were 
used after a time. The oil was so imperfectly separated 
by the feet that that custom is now discontinued. 

Without cultivation the olive soon ceases to yield; 
hence the soil underneath it is plowed every spring, or of- 
tener, so as to admit the air to the roots. No crop is raised 
as under other fruit trees. The earth is also drawn around 
the tree to keep it moist, but neither manuring nor pruning 
is practiced. It yields a full crop only every second 
year. 

At the present time the mills used in obtaining the oil 
are of two kinds; the one, worked by hand, consisting of a 
heavy stone wheel, which is rolled over the berries thrown 
into a stone basin. When crushed, they are taken out as 
pulp and put into straw baskets, which are then placed in a 
screw press and squeezed. The oil thus obtained is of ex- 
cellent quality, though inferior to the beaten; but a third 
quality is obtained by subjecting the already pressed pulp 
to a second squeezing. The other mill is a hollow cylin- 
der, with iron rods projecting at the lower end. It stands 
upright, and turns on a round framework of stone, the iron 
rods beating the olives to pulp as they are thrown in. Aft- 
er being thus reduced they are put under a great beam, 

* Ex. 27: 20. 1 



552 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



heavily weighted at the end, and the oil is pressed out. It 
is then put into the ordinary skin bottles and is ready for 
the market.* Traveling in Palestine one meets at many 
places the Arabs taking the product of the olives to the 
market. Two skins filled with oil are tied together and 
slung over the back of the patient donkey, and in this way 
it is transported long distances. 

I continued my walk along the smooth carriage road, 
now completed nearly as far east as Jericho. Just before 
reaching the brow of the hill an Arab overtook me and 
the usual eastern salutation was exchanged. He seemed 
anxious to talk, and what with making signs and using the 
few Arabic words I had learned, we got on quite well to- 
gether. Near the top of the hill we came to the mouth of 
an open pit or cistern partly filled with water. My com- 
panion pointed to the cistern and said, " Moyah," the 
Arabic word for water, and then, raising his eyes and point- 
ing heavenward, he reverently pronounced the word 
"Allah" (God), and I knew he was telling me that God 
had given the water in the cistern from the clouds of 
heaven. Near the cistern a woman was engaged in wash- 
ing. She had drawn water from the cistern and poured it 
into a depression in the rock. Kneeling beside this she 
folded the garment and then threw water on it with her 
hands and pounded it with a small stone. The process of 
putting on water with the hands and pounding with the 
stone was continued until the garment was clean; that is, 
according to the Arab idea of cleanliness. 

These open pits or cisterns are to be seen at many 
places and are a source of considerable danger. In Bible 
times a law was made compelling the people to cover 
their cisterns or pay damage if an accident occurred, 

♦Geikie, " The Holy Land and the Bible," 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



553 



"And if a man shall open a pit, or if a man shall dig a pit, 
and not cover it, and an ox or an ass fall therein; the 
owner of the pit shall make it good, and give money unto 
the owner of them; and the dead beast shall be his."* It 
was into a pit of this kind that Joseph was cast by his en- 
vious brethren. It will be noticed that the Bible says, 
"And the pit ' was empty, there was no water in it.";j* 
From these water-pits or cisterns David drew some of his 
striking figures when he wrote the Psalms: " He brought 
me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, 
and set my feet upon a rock. "J During the rainy season 
the cisterns are filled from the water running down the 
hillsides. As a result clay is carried into them, and when 
the water has been taken out the bottom of the cistern is 
in the condition described by the Psalmist. A man falling 
in would sink into " the miry clay " at the bottom, and 
when rescued and lifted out his feet would be placed on 
the solid rock at the mouth of the pit. It sometimes hap- 
pened that the man who digged a pit and left it uncovered 
fell into it himself, and this led the Wise Man to say: 
"Whoso causeth the righteous to go astray in an evil way, 
he shall fall himself into his own pit."§ The references 
made to these open pits by the Savior when he rebuked 
the Pharisees for their hypocrisy concerning the Sabbath 
Day are familiar to all.]] 

And now I am at Bethany, the home of Martha, Mary 
and Lazarus. Here it was that the Master had his home, 
and here he slept at night during his ministry at Jerusalem, 
Three of his visits to Bethany are especially noticed in the 

*Ex. 21 : 33, 34. 

fGen. 37: 24. 

X Ps. 40: 2. 

§Prov. 28: 10. 

|| Matt. 12: ii ; Luke 14: 5. 



554 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

New Testament: once when Mary sat at his feet and care- 
ful Martha complained of her sister;* again when his 
friend Lazarus sickened and died, and he raised him from 
the dead;f and again when he was in Bethany at the house 
of Simon the leper, and Mary opened the alabaster box of 
ointment and anointed his body for his burial. J From the 
time of this last event the Savior seems to have spent 
every night at Bethany until the evening before his death, 
when he remained in Jerusalem and ate his last supper 
with his disciples and was betrayed later that same night 
in the Garden of Gethsemane. 

As to the exact site of the ancient village of Bethany 
there is some difference of opinion, and I have no disposi- 
tion to enter into this controversy. John says: "It was 
nigh unto Jerusalem, about fifteen furlongs off,"§ and it is 
also well known that in coming from and in going to the 
village from Jerusalem the Savior crossed over the Mount 
of Olives. For myself, I have no doubt that the village 
yonder, known to the Arabs as el-Azariyeh, in which the 
name of Lazarus is clearly distinguishable, if not occupy- 
ing the exact site of Bethany, is near enough to it to be 
practically the same. Here, too, is a cave-like opening in 
which there are ancient tombs. It will be remembered 
that when Jesus came to the tomb of Lazarus he found 
that "it was a cave, and a stone lay upon it."jj I am well 
satisfied with the identity of the place and, finding a seat 
beneath the shade of an olive tree over against the village 
and not far away from the tombs, I sit down to rest, 

*Luke 10 : 38-42. 
f John 11. 
$ Matt. 26: 6-13. 
§John 11: 18. 
II John 11:38. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



555 



I realize fully that this little village and its surround- ■ 
ings was the scene of some of the wonderful events in the 
life of our blessed Lord. Here was the home to which he 
loved to retreat after the busy work of the day was com- 
pleted. It was from here that the pathetic message was 
sent to him: "Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick."* 
It was not far from this very place that the dear Lord led 
his disciples the last hours that he spent with them on 
earth, and here "he lifted up his hands, and blessed them. . 
And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted 
from them, and carried up into heaven. "f 

Sitting here restfully in the shade of the tree I read 
over again and again the story of the death and the resur- 
rection from the dead of the man whom Jesus loved. 
Who could read it here where it all occurred without being 
deeply impressed? The entire incident, with all its de- 
tails, is so in harmony with the surroundings and with the 
-customs of the times when it occurred, many of which 
obtain here yet, that it seems quite natural. The message 
to the Lord, the death and burial of Lazarus, the coming 
of the friends of the family from Jerusalem to mourn with 
and comfort them, are all quite in harmony with the cus- 
toms of the times. Then comes the touching meeting 
between the Lord and the sisters of the dead man, and 
the words wrung from their sorrowing hearts: "Lord, if 
thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. "J How 
these words touched the sympathetic heart of the dear 
Lord, and how he wept with the weeping sisters! Here 
we have the words of promise that have gladdened the 
heart of every Christian since they were uttered, "I am 

*John ii : 3. 
fLuke 24: 50, 51. 
$ John 11: 21. 



556 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, 
though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever 
liveth and believeth in me shall never die."* The sad 
procession wends its way yonder to the grave, and the 
command is given to take away the stone. The Lord lift- 
ing up his eyes prayed earnestly to the Father that he 
would hear him, and then crying with a loud voice he said, 
"Lazarus, come forth." And behold the dead form re- 
ceives life and comes forth from the grave. The account 
closes here. One could wish that a glimpse of the reunion 
of the brother and sisters might have been given. There 
must have been rejoicing that day in the little village on 
the eastern slope of Olivet. And how their joy must have 
been pervaded with gratitude to the Lord for what he had 
done for them, and chastened by holy fear, for in their 
midst sat one who had gone beyond the portals of the 
grave and had been called back to life by the voice of the 
Son of God. 

The sun is declining in the western horizon, and the 
Mount of Olives casts its shadow over Bethany and the 
tomb of Lazarus. Several children from the village have 
discovered my retreat and stand at a respectful distance 
watching with curious eyes the movements of Howadjii, as 
they call me. I turn my face again toward Jerusalem. In 
the western sky I notice a little cloud no larger than a 
man's hand. I have only a mile and a half to walk, and 1 
make no haste to get me down. Presently the sun is ob- 
scured and I quicken my pace. Reaching the Garden of 
Gethsemane and crossing the brook of Kidron I climb 
up the steep path to St. Stephen's Gate, but before I enter 
the city the " heaven is black with clouds 1 ' and the rain 
commences falling. I hurry on and reach the hotel in a 

* John ii; 25, 26. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



drenching shower. The sudden rain storm reminds me of 
Elijah and Ahab's experience on Mount Carmel. There 
appeared a little cloud, arising out of the sea to the west, 
"like a man's hand. And he said, Go up, say unto Ahab, 
Prepare thy chariot, and get thee down, that the rain stop 
thee not. And it came to pass in the mean while, that the 
heaven was black with clouds and wind, and there was a 
great rain."* 

And so the day spent on Olivet and at Bethany ends; 
but the memory of this day will remain with me while life 
and reason last. 

*i Kings 18: 44, 45. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

Peculiar People — The Jews a Persecuted Race — Their Hopes of the 
Future. — The Place of Wailing. — The Spoffords.—An Interesting 
Story. — Shipwreck. — Waiting for the Coming of the Lord in Je- 
rusalem. — Prophecy. — The New City. — The Tombs. — The Ash 
Heap. — Wine Press. — Vi?ieyards. 

1 g|pERUSALEM is a common center to which are 
drawn multitudes of peculiar people from nearly 
fWSl? all parts of the habitable globe. They come to 
the Holy City prompted by religious convictions and 
opinions which are so vague and visionary in their char- 
acter that, were it not for the zeal manifested and the 
sacrifices made by those who are thus actuated, we could 
have but little patience with them. But when we are 
brought face to face with the fact that these people leave 
their homes and friends, sacrificing all that humanity gen- 
erally holds most dear in this world, then our impatience 
turns to pity, and at most we can only say their zeal is 
without knowledge. 

No class of people who are thus drawn to Jerusalem 
are more interesting to us than the sons of Jacob. Main- 
taining their identity, their race peculiarities, their lan- 
guage and their customs, the Jews are a miracle in 
themselves. No race of people has been more bitterly or 
cruelly persecuted than the Jews. Without a country or 
a home they have been broken and scattered to the four 
quarters of the globe. They have been robbed, tortured, 
burned at the stake, and subjected to the most fiendish 

SS8 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 559 

cruelty that the ingenuity of their persecutors could invent. 
They have become a byword among all the nations of the 
earth. And yet, notwithstanding they have thus been 
persecuted and cast out as the offscouring of the earth, 
they have clung to their faith and their peculiarities. The' 
world affords no similar example of faith and steadfastness 
of purpose. The nearest approach to it is found in the 
persecution of the early Christians. But this ceased at 
the conversion of Constantine, and then for centuries the 
church was comparatively free from persecution. The 
persecution of the Jews still goes on. The last nation to 
place the iron hand on them in modern times is Russia, a 
so-called Christian country. How clearly in all this is 
marked out the fulfillment of prophecy: "Thou makest us 
a byword among the heathen."* The Jews are to be found 
in almost every nation under the sun, for the prophet said, 
"I shall scatter them among the nations, and disperse them 
in the countries."! And again, speaking of the dispersion 
of Israel, it is said that they shall be broken and scattered 
as a potter's vessel is broken in pieces and the sherds 
strewn upon the ground.J The dispersion is to be com- 
plete^ the ho use of Israel is to be sifted "among all 
nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve." In the history 
of God's dealings with this people the words of his holy 
prophets have been literally fulfilled. 

And so to-day devout Jews from almost every nation 
under the sun come here to the Holy City, holy and dear 
to them in a special sense, to pray and to die, so that they 
may receive burial under the shadow of the walls of Zion. 
For centuries they have come, hoping against hope for the 

*Ps. 4 4: 14- 
fEzek. 12: 15. 
Jlsa. 30: 14. 
§ Amos 9: 9. 



^60 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

coming of the long-expected Messiah who, according tc 
their faith, is to restore the throne of Israel to the house 
of David, to drive out the oppressor and to set up, with 
Jerusalem as its capital, an earthly kingdom which shall 
far exceed in power and magnificence the splendor of the 
most prosperous days of David and Solomon. For this 
consummation of their dearest earthly hope they constant- 
ly pray, and for more than twelve hundred years they have 
assembled at the inner temple platform wall, where there 
is still to be seen a portion of the wall built by Solomon's 
builders. Here they weep and mourn over the destruction 
of Zion and pray to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob 
for the speedy coming of the deliverer. 

We visited the Jews' wailing place a number of times 
while we were in Jerusalem and never without absorbing 
interest. The annexed reproduction of a photograph 
shows the faces of some of the mourners, as well as their 
mode of dress and general appearance. The picture is so 
well executed that the faces would be easily recognizable 
by any one acquainted with the originals. At one time 
during a visit to the Jews' wailing place we counted one 
hundred and thirty-five men and women collected at the 
wall mourning over their beloved city. It is a sad sight, 
and although we visited the place a number of times we 
never went there without feeling deeply impressed with the 
zeal and devotion of the Jews. 

The massive stones, hewn out of the mountain and 
placed in the wall by Solomon's builders, are clearly 
brought out in the picture. A curious custom prevails 
among the Jews who visit this place. Each one tries to 
drive a nail or a bit of old iron into the joints between the 
stones, and they have succeeded in driving thousands of 
nails into the wall. Whether this custom grows out of a 




r 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 563 

desire to drive "a nail in a sure place,"* or from the wish 
to have a possession in Jerusalem, be it ever so small, we 
cannot say. The custom prevails and it is curious in its 
way. 

Many times is the question asked as to the future of 
the Jews. Will a remnant of Israel be saved? We do not 
propose to discuss this question. Volumes have been 
written upon it, and some difference of opinion obtains 
among those who have given the subject thought and 
study. The belief that a remnant of Israel will be restored 
is based on the prophecies of the Old and upon what is 
said in the New Testament on the subject. In the former 
frequent reference is made to the saving of Israel, and the 
Master in speaking of Jerusalem says it "shall be trodden 
down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be 
fulfilled."!. An d Paul refers to the same thing when he 
says "that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until 
the fullness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel 
shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of 
Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from 
Jacob."J According co these promises it seems to us we 
may look for the restoration of Israel. It will come, how- 
ever, when the blindness has been removed from the eyes 
of Israel, and the gathering of the Jews at Jerusalem may 
indicate that the full ness of the times of the Gentiles may 
not be far distant. Since our first visit to the Holy City 
nine years ago large numbers of Jews have collected here; 
but about a year ago the Sultan of Turkey issued an edict 
forbidding Jews to land in Palestine, and this order has for 
the present put a stop to the influx of these people. In 

*Isa. 22: 23. 
t Luke 21: 24. 
$ Rom. 11: 25, 26. 



564 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

God's own good time, however, Israel will be restored, the 
Sultan's edicts to the contrary notwithstanding. 

We were also interested in another class of people 
who are living at Jerusalem waiting patiently for the sec- 
ond coming of the Lord and the ushering in of the mil- 
lennium. They are known as the American Colony, and 
they have an interesting history. Some fifteen years ago 
there lived in the City of Chicago an eminently successful 
lawyer by the name of Spofford. He had a large and 
profitable practice and had amassed considerable wealth. 
His wife was a woman of education and culture, and his 
home was blessed with the happy faces of four beautiful 
children. In order to enjoy a season of rest from hard 
work Mr. Spofford took his family to Europe to spend the 
summer. At Paris he received a dispatch calling him 
home at once to look after some important business. He 
left his family in the gay capital of Europe and hurried 
home by the first steamer. Several weeks later his wife 
and children determined to follow him. They took pas- 
sage on the ill-fated French steamer Ville du Havre for 
New York. But the ship never reached her port. In mid- 
ocean she came into collision with another vessel, and she 
went to the bottom of the sea with nearly all her passen- 
gers. Mrs. Spofford and one of her children, the youngest, 
were among the saved. She was in the water a number 
of hours, clinging to a piece of the wreck and holding her 
child in her arms. It was while floating in the water that 
the impression was made upon her mind that changed the 
entire course of her and her husband's life. 

Reaching her home in Chicago, now made desolate by 
the loss of the children who were sleeping beneath the 
waters of the ocean, she revealed to her husband what 
seemed to her to be God's will concerning them. This 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



565 



was to sell all their earthly possessions leave their home 
and friends and go to Jerusalem, and there await the 
coming of Christ. And this they did. They reached the 
city some twelve years ago, with a number of friends who 
were induced to accept their views. Here, in comparative 
poverty and obscurity, they have lived since. Mr. Spofford 
became well known among the native Arabs and was 
called the "Good Father." He was kind-hearted and gave 
to others until his money was all gone. Two years ago he 
died. Mrs. Spofford is still the leading spirit in the little 
commumty. 

We called upon her and found a pleasant, highly- 
cultured woman. She has a remarkable knowledge of the 
Scriptures, is a fluent and ready talker, and impressed us 
as one who had known suffering and sorrow. And yet 
the years of waiting and disappointment have not lessened 
her faith in her peculiar belief, and she is still waiting 
patiently for the coming of the Lord. She holds literally 
the Scripture which says we must give up all for Christ's 
sake, and this means to her father, mother, husband, chil- 
dren, friends and all earthly possessions. She believes 
that if all professed Christians would do this the Lord 
would not delay his second coming. 

Since our visit to the Holy City in 1884 there has been, 
it may be said, a new Jerusalem built outside the walls of 
the old city. The buildings extend northward along the 
Jaffa Road about three-fourths of a mile. They extend 
also as far west as the upper part of Gihon, and eastward 
toward the upper valley of the brook of Kidron. We 
were much interested in our walks about the new city, 
especially after our attention was called to the fact that 
there seems to be a possibility that the present course of 
building is in line with prophecy. If this be true the sub- 



566 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



ject assumes a very interesting phase indeed. The proph- 
ecy alluded to reads as follows: " Behold, the days come, 
saith the Lord, that the city shall be built to the Lord 
from the tower of Hananeel unto the gate of the corner. 
And the measuring line shall yet go. forth over against it 
upon the hill Gareb, and shall compass about to Goath. 
And the whole valley of the dead bodies, and of the ashes, 
and all the fields unto the brook of Kidron, unto the 
corner of the horse gate toward the east, shall be holy 
unto the Lord; it shall not be plucked up, nor thrown 
down any more for ever."* And again the prophet says: 
"Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls for 
the multitude of men and cattle therein. All the land 
shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of 
Jerusalem: and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her 
place, from Benjamin's gate unto the place of the first 
gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananeel 
unto the king's winepresses. "f 

In company with the Elder and Jacob, a converted 
Jew, we walked about the new city and noted the line of 
building. 

One part of prophecy has been literally fulfilled: 
"Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls."J 
When this was spoken the walls of the city were a pro- 
tection to the inhabitants, and during the day watchmen 
stood on the towers above the gates to give warning of the 
approach of an enemy. At night the gates were closed 
and securely barred to keep out all intruders,. This con- 
dition of affairs has continued even until modern times, 
and it has been only a very few years since the gates have 
not been closed at night. Now they are left open and 

*Jer. 31:38-40. 

fZech. 2: 4; 14: 10. 
|Zech. 2: 4. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



567 



people dwell in safety within and without the walls, as in 
"towns without walls." 

Those who regard the building of the new city as in 
line with the fulfillment of prophecy place the tower of 
Hananeel, from which the buildings were to start, near 
the Jaffa Gate, Walking out of the Jaffa Gate with this 
thought in mind, we find that many new buildings have 
been erected since our former visit. The walls northeast 
of the gate are entirely hidden from view by new build- 
ings, and a street running along the line of the Jaffa Road 
has shops and stores on either side. Following the course 
of this street, in a few minutes' walk we reach a new hotel, 
built for the accommodation of travelers. We follow the 
course of the strong, well-constructed, cut-stone build- 
ings, many of them large and well built, to the hills of 
Gareb and Goath, or at least to what are, in our guide's 
mind, those localities. If the tower of Hananeel be at or 
near the Jaffa Gate, and if these places pointed out be the 
hills of Gareb and Goath, then thus far the buildings are 
exactly in line with the prophecy of Jeremiah. Our guide, 
Jacob, was fully persuaded in his own mind that this is 
the case, and that the building of the new city is certainly 
a fulfillment of the prophecy referred to. 

We now turn our faces eastward, and after crossing 
several fields and climbing over the stone walls, we reach 
a large stone-quarry, where a number of Jews are engaged 
in quarrying and cutting stone for building purposes. The 
work is carried on by a benevolent German who has in- 
terested himself in behalf of the poor Jews. He gives 
them employment, and thus while helping them gets them 
to work. The rock here is the blue limestone and is quite 
hard. After it has been blasted and the larger stones cut 
and removed, the smaller ones are thrown into the cavity 



568 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

and covered with earth. Then, after the rainy season is 
over, olive trees are planted. Near by the quarry the 
German has put up a soap factory, where soap is made 
with olive oil as a base. As the Jews here are very ortho- 
dox they will use no soap in which animal fat is used. 
The German is a benefactor in more ways than one, for the 
Jews at Jerusalem surely need soap, and plenty of it. 

Leaving the quarry, near which has recently been 
discovered an old-time wine press, from which the place 
has been called "Abraham's vineyard," we climb over 
stone walls, and after walking a considerable distance 
reach a valley along the rocky sides of which are a number 
of tombs cut in the solid limestone. Most travelers who 
visit Jerusalem satisfy themselves by going to the Tombs 
of the Kings, not knowing that this valley contains very 
many interesting tombs. After examining a number of 
these tombs we climbed to the top of the hill and were 
surprised to note that the buildings were being constructed 
in the line of this "valley of the dead bodies," and we set 
down another item in the prophecy which seems to be in 
the course of fulfillment. 

From the "valley of the dead bodies" we next reach 
the recently discovered wine presses which, owing to the 
great size of the wine vats and the immense cellar in which 
to store the wine, have been called, perhaps not incorrect- 
ly, the king's wine presses. We leave a description of the 
wine press until we complete our walk. A single glance 
at the buildings constructed shows that they are reaching 
out toward the wine press; and if this be the "king's wine 
press," spoken of by Zechariah, we may set down another 
item in which the prophecy is being fulfilled. 

Continuing our walk we next come to a great mound 
which has been opened within the last few years, and has 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



569 



been found to be a great ash heap. Two theories are held 
as to this great mound of ashes, which is now being taken 
away and used in making mortar for building purposes. 
One is that there must have been at one time a large soap 
factory here, and the ashes are the result. The other is 
that the ashes were carried here from the temple when the 
offerings were burned, and that this great heap was 
gathered here century after century from the altar of burnt 
offerings. This latter theory is supported by the fact that 
according to the law the ashes of the burnt offering were 
to be carried without the camp: "And the priest shall . . 
take up the ashes which the fire hath consumed with the 
burnt offering on the altar, and he shall put them beside 
the altar. And he shall put off his garments, and put on 
other garments, and carry forth the ashes without the 
camp unto a clean place. "* This place, say they who 
support this theory, is where the ashes were thrown and 
the accumulations here for nearly a thousand years formed 
this great mound. Another fact is also given us by Jacob. 
A quantity of the ashes was sent to England and America, 
and was carefully analyzed and found to contain both 
vegetable and animal matter. This statement is held to 
prove that the ashes, coming from the wood on the altar 
and the flesh of the burnt offering, would contain just the 
elements found in these great mounds; hence here is the 
clean place "without the camp" where the ashes from the 
altar of the burnt offering were thrown. This being true, 
when the prophet spoke of the rebuilding of the new city 
without walls he referred to the valley "of the ashes" as a 
place well known and said the measuring line of the 
builders should come this way. Standing on the mound 
and looking around us we see that some of the new houses 



*Lev. 6: 10, 11. 



570 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



are within a short distance of the ashes. If these be the 
ashes referred to by the prophet, we may set down another 
item in which the prophecy is being fulfilled. 

From the ash mound we cross over the hills and fields 
"unto the brook of Kidron." North of Jerusalem is the 
ridge which divides the watershed between the Great and 
the Dead seas. Standing on this ridge we see to the 
north the depression sinking away and forming a valley 
through which the waters flow toward and finally into the 
Mediterranean; while southward the depression forms the 
valley of Jehoshaphat, through which the brook of Kidron 
flows between Olivet and Moriah, uniting with the valley 
of Hinnom south of Jerusalem and continuing on to the 
Dead Sea. Here are "all the fields unto the brook of 
Kidron," and here too comes the line of the new buildings, 
some of which have already been constructed in the fields. 
Here we may set down still another item in the prophecy 
which is being fulfilled. 

Thus far we have followed our guide, and now, as the 
sun is setting behind the western hills of Judea, we hurry 
back to the city. The walk has been full of interest, and 
it has led us to examine very closely the prophecy and the 
question as to whether the new city which is now being 
builded here is the one that "shall not be plucked up, nor 
thrown down any more for ever." The interpretation of 
prophecy, owing to the many figures of speech used, is 
always attended with difficulty, and the best interpretation 
comes in the light of fulfillment. In the prophecies here 
referred to there are some strong points in favor of the 
view that the building of the new city outside the walls of 
the old is in line with their fulfillment. But we cannot 
assuredly say that it is until the various localities named 
are authenticated. Until this is done we can afford to 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



571 



wait, and in the meantime we may rest assured that in 
God's own good time every word of the prophecy of his 
Book will be fulfilled. 

We now go back again to the wine presses which we 
examined very carefully in our walk. These are simply a 
series of vats cut into the solid rock of the hillside and 
connected by gutters through which the juice of the grape 
passed from the full to the empty vats below. The upper 
vat on top of the rocky hillside was not less than four feet 
square and a foot deep. The gutter leading to the next 
vat below was not more than four inches deep. There 
were four vats in the series, all connected as before noted 
with gutters. The three lower vats were much larger and 
deeper than the upper one, and had capacity for a large 
quantity of grape juice. 

The grapes were thrown into the upper vat and here 
the treading process took place. Men, barefoot, trod upon 
the grapes until the entire mass was reduced to pulp and 
juice. Then more grapes were thrown in and the treading 
process continued, and as the upper vat filled the juice was 
carried by the gutter into the vat next below. This process 
was kept up until all the vats were filled. 

Treading the wine press was hard and wearisome labor, 
and as the red grape, with juice red as blood, was grown in 
Palestine, the raiment of those who trod in the vats be- 
came red, and from this fact Isaiah drew one of his most 
vivid figures of speech: "Wherefore art thou red in thine 
apparel, and thy garments like him that treadeth in the 
winefat? I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the 
people there was none with me."* The presses here were 
so large that several men could crush grapes at the same 
time. In some of the smaller wine presses there was but a 



* Isaiah 63: 2, 3. 



57 2 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



single vat and a shallow place at the one side of it where 
the wine press was "trodden alone." The treading out of 
the blood-red juice of the grape is referred to by St. John 
in the Apocalypse where he speaks of the " wine press of the 
fierceness and wrath of Almighty God," and of the wicked 
who are cast into "the great wine press of the wrath of God. 
And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood 
came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles."* 

Near the wine presses is a great cistern or cellar cut 
into the rock in which it is more than likely the wine was 
stored in the skin bottles described in the preceding 
chapter. After the wine had fermented it was taken out of 
the vats and put into the skins, and then stored away in 
the cellars. The one here is forty-six feet deep and, it 
has been estimated, would hold fifty thousand wine skins, 
or not far from a half million gallons of wine. The kings' 
wine cellars were of so much importance that an overseer 
was appointed "over the increase of the vineyards for the 
wine cellars. "f 

The vineyard is also frequently referred to in the 
Scripture. The Savior refers to "a certain householder, 
which planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and 
digged a winepress in it, and built a tower." The same 
conditions exist here now that obtained when the Master 
spoke the parable referred to. In one of our walks we saw a 
husbandman pruning the vine. We noticed with what care 
he cut away the dead and useless branches and how he 
pruned the good branches so that they might bring forth 
more fruit. And then, too, the withered branches were 
gathered into bundles and made ready for the fire. Before 
us we had the same object lesson which Christ beheld when 



*Rev. 14: 20. 
■f 1 Chron. 27: 27. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 573 

he exclaimed: "I am the true vine, and my Father is the 
husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit 
he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he 
purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. If a man 
abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is with- 
ered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and 
they are burned."* 

* John 15: 1, 2, 6. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 



The Patriarch of Jerusalem— An Interesting Interview .—Baptism.— 
Feet-washing.— The Division between Greeks and Latins — Teach- 
ing of the Greek Church.— Number of Communicants. 

NE among our interesting- experiences in Jerusalem 
was a visit to the Patriarch of the Greek church, 
who by virtue of his office is looked upon by all 
Greek Christians with much love and veneration. 
Our visit was arranged for by our excellent dragoman, Mr. 
Tadros, who is a member of the Greek church and in every 
respect a reliable guide. He speaks English very fluently 
and, being a native of Jerusalem, is thoroughly posted. 
Should any of our readers visit Jerusalem and require a 
dragoman they will find in Mr. Tadros a most trustworthy 
and excellent guide, one who can always be depended 
upon. 

At the appointed hour, in company with our dragoman, 
we went to the Patriarch's home and were met at the door 
by his archdeacon, Father Stephanus, and conducted into a 
finely-furnished audience room. The deacon spoke Eng- 
lish with remarkable* fluency. He informed us that he 
had spent several years in America and was well pleased 
with our country. After waiting a few minutes the Patri- 
arch in his official robes came into the room and received 
us very kindly and with warm-hearted cordiality. To us 
this was all the more surprising, for we carried no letters of 
introduction to him, and were simply presented as travelers 
especially interested in the religious practice of the Greek 

S74 




WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 575 

church. After being seated a servant came in with pre- 
served fruit and water, and each of the guests was served 
with a portion of the sweetmeats. After this coffee was 
served; and when these necessary acts of hospitality were 
dispensed with we were ready for the interview. 




A Greek Priest. 

The Patriarch, who is known as "His Beatitude Giras- 
IMO, Patriarch of the Church of Jerusalem and of Syria," is 
a fine-looking, intelligent man of about fifty years. He has 
a pleasant face and wore the dress and cap of the Greek 
priest. Like all eastern people he wears a full beard, as in- 



576 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



dicated in the annexed engraving. He spoke in the Greek 
tongue and his archdeacon acted as interpreter. 

The Patriarch impressed us as being a kind-hearted 
man, well informed as to the church over which he holds 
the bishopric. He made us feel quite at home, and very 
kindly inquired concerning the object of our visit to him. 
We told him of our interest in the practice of the early 
Christian church, and of the efforts of our own people in a 
reformatory movement to re-establish apostolic and primi- 
tive Christianity. He expressed pleasure at hearing this 
declaration, and at once said he would be very happy in- 
deed to give us any information possible in regard to the 
practice of the Greek church, and kindly invited us to ask 
questions. We made the best use of the liberty granted, 
and spent an hour in asking questions bearing on the sub- 
ject and receiving answers to them. The result of the in- 
terview is given in an abridged form from notes taken at 
the time. Many questions were asked and answered, but 
the following contains the substance of the interview: 

i. What is the faith and practice of the Greek church 
as to baptism? 

"We believe that Jesus Christ was baptized in the Jor- 
dan by John the Baptist by immersion. We believe the 
Holy Commission,* given by Jesus Christ to his apostles, 
and the church teaches that those who believe are to be 
baptized into the name of the Father, and into the name of 
the Son, and into the name of the Holy Ghost. So reads 
the Greek. In practice we take the adult candidate into 
the water, dipping him face forward three times, once into 
each of the three names in the Holy Trinity. In admin- 
istering the ordinance of baptism, the minister uses the 
following formula: 'I, the servant of God, baptize thee 

* Matt. 28: 19. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



577 



(pronouncing the surname of the candidate) into the name 
of the Father (dipping the candidate), and into the name 
of the Son (dipping the candidate), and into the name of 
the Holy Ghost (again dipping the candidate).' So Christ 
commanded. So the holy apostles baptized, so they hand- 
ed it down to us, so we baptize." 

2. Does the Greek church practice the rite of feet- 
washing? 

"Yes! The last night Christ was with his disciples he 
washed his disciples' feet, and wiped them with the towel 
wherewith he was girded.* This event occurred in the City 
of Jerusalem. Following the example of Jesus, we wash 
feet here once each year. The ceremony takes place dur- 
ing the Holy or Easter week. In practice twelve priests 
are selected and their feet are washed by the Patriarch. 
Patriarchs and bishops may wash feet in any of the Greek 
churches, but the practice is not now held as a dogma or 
doctrine of the church. The observance of washing feet is 
practiced at many places among the Greeks who are desir- 
ous of following the example of Christ." 

3. What view do you take of the ancient agape or 
feast of love? 

"In the early centuries of the Christian church the 
love-feast or agape was observed by all Christians. It was 
an apostolic practice, based on the ^example of Christ, 
who ate a supper with his disciples the night of his betray- 
al, when he instituted the Eucharist. The church at first 
was full of love and there was more simplicity among them. 
They then kept the feast of love. Later, as the church 
grew in numbers, abuses crept in, and because of abuses 
and excesses in the observance of the last supper or feast 
of love it fell into disrepute, gradually dropped out of 



* John 13. 



578 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



practice, and was finally set aside by an action of a great 
council. But the Greek church still keeps the spirit of the 
agape alive in a symbol of love, and this is done in the 
salutation of the holy kiss." 

4. In what way do you observe the salutation to 
which you have referred? 

"The Greek church maintain the apostolic form of 
salutation, and salute one another with an holy kiss* In 
binding ourselves together with the kiss of love we symbol- 
ize the feast of love. In giving the salutation, equals salute 
each other by clasping hands and kissing each other on the 
lips or cheeks; those who are inferior, by kissing the hand 
of the superior; as, for example, the laymembers salute the 
patriarch or bishop by kissing his hand. The hand is 
grasped and the lips pressed to the back of it. In this way 
the Greek church maintain the apostolic practice and 
form of the salutation of the holy kiss." 

At the close of the interview, which to us was exceed- 
ingly interesting, the Patriarch, when he knew that we 
intended to visit the Seven Churches of Asia, gave us a 
letter of introduction to the bishop of the church at 
Smyrna, which afterward proved quite helpful to us in our 
travels among the churches of the Apocalypse. We were 
also kindly invited to visit the ancient library, which is 
rich in old manuscripts and valuable books. 

Other travelers who have visited and written of Jeru- 
salem also refer to the Greek Patriarch and the practice of 
his church. Dr. Henry M. Field, who witnessed the cere- 
mony of the washing of feet, says: "When it came to the 
feet-washing, the Patriarch, laying aside his costly vest- 
ments, girded himself with a towel, in imitation of his 
Divine Master, began to wash the feet of those who 

*Rom 16: 16; 1 Cor. 16: 20; 2 Cor. 13: 12; 1 Thess. 5: 26; 1 Peter 5: 14. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



579 



represented the apostles." Dr. Schaff also witnessed the 
feet-washing during Easter week, but passes it without 
comment, simply referring to it as one of the sights in 
which he was interested at Jerusalem. 

As to numbers, wealth and influence, the Greek church 
is much the strongest in Jerusalem, and in the last ten 
years there has been much activity in the old church. 
New churches have been built, notably those on the 
Mount of Olives, and land about the city purchased; and 
this has been so wisely done that to-day the Greeks have a 
very strong hold in and about Jerusalem. The Russian 
Government, the nominal head of the church in Russia, 
is back of the Greeks in Jerusalem, and this gives them 
power and influence that they would not otherwise possess. 
The native members are mostly Arabs who speak the 
Arabic, and are but little in advance of the native Moham- 
medans in intelligence. The ministers speak modern 
Greek, and come from the Greek islands. Many of them 
are well educated. 

The Greek, or more properly speaking the Eastern, 
church is the source of the Latin or Western church, now 
known as the Roman Catholic. Christianity was estab- 
lished in the East, and the Scriptures were written in the 
Greek language. The first church services were also con- 
ducted in that language. After Christianity was intro- 
duced into Rome and other parts of Europe differences 
of opinion obtained between the East and the West. The 
East, always conservative and slow to change, clung to 
apostolic Christianity long after it had been entirely aban- 
doned by the Latins in the West. At first there were five 
patriarchs: the bishops of Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, 
Constantinople, and Rome. After the division the Patri- 
arch of Rome became the pope, and was held by the 



580 WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 

Roman church to have supreme power over all the 
churches as the representative of Christ. 

To the eastern mind the idea of a pope with full 
ecclesiastical and plenary power was repugnant. In the 
Greek church the power was vested in the patriarchs and 
bishops, and the claim of the Bishop of Rome to the 
supreme control of all the churches was stoutly denied 
and repelled. In the East the pope was held as a heretic. 
The division widened, and after the fifth century was 
strongly manifest in the councils. Then came efforts to 
reconcile the conflicting elements, but without success. 
At length, in 1054, Pope Leo IX excommunicated the 
whole Eastern church. The division had been complete 
before this, and the action of the Roman prelate may be 
regarded as a useless display of power. He excommuni- 
cated those who for centuries did not hold to the Roman 
church. After the action of Leo IX efforts were again 
made to"* unite the Roman and Greek churches, but failed. 
Among other points of differences was that of the proces- 
sion of the Holy Ghost, the Greek church holding that it 
proceeds from the Father only, while the Romans taught that 
the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father and the Son/' 

The Patriarch of Jerusalem has control over Syria, the 
country east of the Jordan known as Petra, and the Sinaitic 
Peninsula. Within his jurisdiction there are seven arch- 
bishops located as follows: Cesarea, Scythopolis, Petra, 
Ptolemais, Sinai, Shechem and Samaria. 

The orthodox Greek church teaches that Christianity 
is a divine revelation given to the world by Christ; the 
Bible contains its saving truth, having been written 
through the influence of the Holy Ghost. The church 
interprets the Scriptures, but every believer should read 
them. Tradition is also held to be binding on the church. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



581 



God is a trinity, the Divine essence existing in three 
persons equal in nature and dignity, the Father, the Son 
and the Holy Ghost; the Holy Ghost proceeds from the 
Father only. 

Man was created with immortality, perfect wisdom, 
and a will regulated by reason. Through the first sin 
Adam and his posterity lost immortality and his will re- 
ceived a bias toward evil. In this natural state man, who 
even before he actually sins is a sinner before God by 
original or inherited sin, commits many transgressions; but 
is not entirely without power of will toward good, and is 
not always doing evil. 

Christ, the Son of God, became man in two natures, 
which, inseparably united, make One Person, and, accord- 
ing to the eternal purpose of God, has obtained reconcilia- 
tion with God, and eternal life. Christ by his vicarious 
suffering has made satisfaction to God for the world's 
sins, and this satisfaction was perfectly commensurate with 
the sins of the world. Man is made a partaker of the 
reconciliation in the spiritual regeneration which he attains 
to, being led and kept by the Holy Ghost. This divine 
help is offered to all men without distinction, and may be 
rejected. In order to attain to salvation, man is justified, 
and when so justified can do no more than the commands 
of God. He may fall from a state of grace through mor- 
tal sin. 

Regeneration is offered by the Word of God and in 
the sacraments, which under visible signs communicate 
God's invisible grace to Christians. Baptism entirely 
destroys original sin. In the bread and wine of the Com- 
munion the body and blood of Christ are substantially 
present, and all Christians should receive them. The new 
birth, when lost, may be restored through repentance. . 



582 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



The church of Christ is the fellowship of all those 
who accept and profess all the articles of faith transmitted 
by the apostles and approved by the General Synods. 
Without this visible church there is no salvation. It is 
under the abiding influence of the Holy Ghost, and there- 
fore cannot err in matters of faith. Specially appointed 
persons are necessary in the church, and they form a three- 
fold order, distinct from other Christians, of bishops, 
priests and deacons. The four patriarchs, of equal dignity, 
have the highest rank among the bishops, and the bishops 
united in a General Council, represent the church, and 
infallibly decide, under the guidance of the Holy Ghost, 
all matters of faith and ecclesiastical life. All ministers of 
Christ must be regularly called and appointed to their 
office, and are consecrated by the sacrament of orders. 
Bishops must be unmarried, and ministers and deacons 
must not marry the second time. To all ministers in com- 
mon belongs, besides the preaching of the Word, the 
administration of the six Sacraments, — Baptism, Confirma- 
tion, Penance, Eucharist, Matrimony, Anointing the Sick 
with Oil. The bishops alone can administer the Sacrament 
of Orders, i. e. y laying on of hands and ordaining ministers. 
Monks are alone eligible for election as bishops, and from 
the bishops the patriarchs are selected.* 

The number of adherents to the Greek church can be 
given only approximately. This is due to the fact that a 
correct census is never taken among eastern peoples. The 
following figures will be found not far from correct: 



Russia, including Poland. Siberia and the Caucasus, 58,000,000 

Turkey, 10,000,000 

Austria, 3,000,000 

Roumania, 4,529,000 

Servia, Montenegro, Greece, 2,785,000 

All other countries, 10,492,000 

Total, 88,806,000 



*" Encyclopedia Britannica," under " Greek Church," page 159. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 583 

*> 

In round numbers it may be stated that there are now 
ninety million adherents to the Greek church, more than 
half of whom are to be found in Russia. While there is 
much formalism among these people, and while they have 
permitted many innovations to creep into their church, 
they still cling with considerable tenacity to many of the 
apostolic practices. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 



Homeward Bound.— Down to Jaffa. — The Last View of Canaan. — Mt 
Carmel. — Elijah and Elisha. — Tyre and Sidon. — Antioch. — Tarsus 
— Smyrna, and the Seven Churches of Asia. — Greece. — Athens. — 
Corinth. — Patros. — Rome Again. — Sailing from Genoa. — A Hurri- 
cane. — New York. 



p^JfrND now the time has come when we must say 
' farewell to the Holy City. The weeks we have 

spent here have been full of interest and of profit 
to us, and we shall not soon forget them. Anxious as we 
are to continue our homeward journey and meet again the 
loved ones waiting for us, we turn away from Jerusalem 
with some degree of reluctance. We wish we had more 
time to spend in walking about the hills and valleys of the 
City of David and learning more of the old, old story 
which she reveals to all who come here to learn. But the 
end must come. We take a last walk about the city, fare- 
wells are said, and we go away feeling that we shall see 
Jerusalem no more. 

We had arranged to go down to Jaffa by carriage, 
preferring this to the railway. Very early in the morning 
we go out of the Jaffa Gate and find a comfortable carriage 
waiting for us. Our friends come out to wish us a safe 
journey. Even our beggar boys are on hand and seem as 
hearty in their good wishes as any in the company. The 
driver takes his place and, touching his Arabian horses 
lightly with the lash, we are off for the seaside. We see 

the last of the walls of the city as we turn into the street 
584 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



585 



of the new Jerusalem. It is a bright, beautiful day. The 
sun shines quite warm, and the air is bracing and just cool 
enough not to be oppressive. With a comfortable carriage 
and a well-filled lunch-box, put up for us by our host of 
the New Hotel, we have all the requisites for a pleasant 
forty-mile drive. Since we passed over the road nine 
years ago it has been graded and macadamized, and the 
roadbed is as smooth and as solid as a floor. With all 
these favorable conditions it may well be imagined that 
our drive from Jerusalem to Jaffa was delightfully pleasant. 

The country passed over is full of historic interest, but 
it is not our purpose to enter into a description of the 
route, as that has already been done.* At the foot of the 
mountains of Judea we stop to rest our horses and eat our 
noonday lunch. Then crossing over the plain of Ajalon we 
reach Ramleh, where we halt again for rest. Here we cross 
the railway and then continue our journey across the 
Plain of Sharon. Late in the evening we reach Jaffa and 
are ready to depart on the morrow for Smyrna. The 
clouds again obscure the sky, and the next morning the 
rain is falling. 

Here at Jaffa we have another illustration of so-called 
Turkish justice, and of the cruelty of these people. Dur- 
ing the night a house near our hotel was broken into and 
in the morning the officers arrested a young Arab, charging 
him with the crime. The only evidence against him was 
that he was a stranger in the town. They bound the poor 
fellow's hands behind him with cords, tying them so tight 
that circulation was impeded. Then they tied him to a 
post near the place where the burglary had been commit- 
ted. There the poor fellow stood in the rain until he was 
wet to the skin and shivering with the cold. About noon 

* " Europe and Bible Lands." 



586 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



an official came up to him and asked him some questions. 
The answers did not seem to suit him, and he flew into a 
great rage and struck the prisoner a number of blows 
with his fist. After he had been standing there about 
seven hours he was taken away and put into an old build- 
ing, and we saw no more of him. 

At two o'clock in the afternoon we get into the small 
rowboat and are taken away from Jaffa to the steamer 
Saturno, which is lying at anchor nearly a mile from the 
shore. The wind is high and the rough sea tosses our 
boat about in a way that is anything but pleasant. We are 
forcibly reminded of the experience of Jonah, but at last 
we reach the ship in safety, none the worse for the trip, 
save a wetting from the spray of the sea. The Saturno is 
to be our home for an eight-day cruise on the Mediterra- 
nean, and we find her to be a staunch boat, strong enough 
for the buffetings of the rough winter sea. 

At four o'clock in the afternoon we hoist anchor and 
are away for Smyrna. In the soft evening twilight we 
watch the receding shores of Canaan. Jaffa is lost to 
sight, the coast line grows dimmer and dimmer, and the 
hills of Judea, reflecting the last rays of the setting sun, 
fade away and are lost in the gloom of coming night. 
During the evening we reach the port of Haifa, where we 
stop to land and take on passengers. 

Yonder dark, mountain-like bluff, forcing its way into 
the sea, is the terminus of Mt. Carmel. Here it was that 
the prophet Elijah entered into a contest with the priests 
of Baal and came out with such a grand victory. To the 
top of this very blitfff the servant of the man of God came 
seven times, looking out over the sea for the first indica- 
tion of the coming rain, and at last reported to his master, 
"Behold, there ariseth a little cloud out of the sea, like a 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



587 



man's hand;"* and very soon the heavens were overcast 
with black, threatening clouds. The rain came down in 
torrents and the three years' drought was broken. Here 
too Elisha, the successor of Elijah, had his home, and it 
was to this place that the Shunammite woman came in sore 
distress because of the death of her boy.f 

Skirting the base of Carmel we sail along the coast of 
ancient Phoenicia, passing by Tyre and Sidon, both places 
of much interest to Bible students. Even in passing one 
cannot help recalling the wonderful fulfillment of proph- 
ecy concerning the City of Tyre: "Therefore thus, saith the 
Lord God; Behold, I am against thee, O Tyrus, and will 
cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea 
causeth his waves to come up. And they shall destroy 
the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers: I will also 
scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a 
rock. It shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the 
midst of the sea."J 

Alexander the Great, when he besieged Tyre, actually 
scraped the earth from the rocks of the ruins of the old 
city to form a roadway to carry on the attack against the 
new town, and the ancient Tyre was made "like the top of 
a rock." The great city was destroyed centuries ago, and 
for centuries was a mere fishing village. When Volney 
visited the place some years ago he wrote: "The whole 
village of Tyre contains only fifty or sixty poor families, 
who live obscurely on the produce of their little and 
trifling fishery."§ Bruce describes Tyre as a place "where 
fishermen spread their nets to dry." Tyre is now a consid- 
erable village, but to-day it is a place for the spreading of 

*t Kings 18: 44. 
|2 Kings 4: 22-37. 
JEzek. 26:3-5. 
§Volney's " Ruins." 



588 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



nets in the midst of the sea. How literally have the words 
of the prophet been fulfilled, and who can doubt the 
inspiration of his words! 

In the early morning we cast anchor off Beyrut and 
have a beautiful view of the Mountains of Lebanon. A 
short stop here and then we sail away to the north to the 
port of Antioch, where Paul and Barnabas did such effec- 
tual missionary work, and where the disciples were first 
called Christians. The city, once noted for its beauty and 
prosperity, is now a village of huts built with mud and 
straw. The people live by the produce of the mulberry 
trees. They also engage in the cultivation of tobacco, 
which, it is said, is of very fine quality. The place contains 
about six thousand souls. 

From Antioch our course takes us to Iskonderoon, a 
seaport in the northeast corner of the Mediterranean, not 
far from Aleppo. Here travelers for Mesopotamia, the 
Euphrates and Tigris usually land and continue their 
journey by caravan route to Nineveh and Babylon, cross- 
ing the Great Arabian Desert before reaching the site of 
these ancient cities of the Bible. 

The port of Tarsus, the birthplace of the Apostle Paul, 
is our next stopping-place. When Saul was born Tarsus 
was "no mean city," for it had nearly one hundred thou- 
sand inhabitants. But the people were vain and luxurious 
in their habits. They lived for pleasure and their motto 
was doubtless the words which Paul quotes, "Let us eat 
and drink; for to morrow we die."* The city was at one 
time the metropolis of Cilicia and stood in a fertile plain 
on either bank of the river Cydnus, twelve miles from its 
mouth. It is now much decayed, is full of ruins, and con- 
tains a Turkish population of seven thousand, in the 

*i Cor. iv- 32. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



589 



summer when it is excessively hot, and of twenty-five 
thousand during the winter months. During the hot 
weather many of the people retire to the Tarsus moun- 
tains, a short distance from the place. 

From Tarsus our course lay by the island of Rhodes. 
Here we had an actual experience of what the Mediterra- 
nean can do in time of storm. Our little ship was very 
unsteady, and the writer,' for the first time on the journey, 
succumbed to seasickness. Rhodes is passed by, also 
Chios, Samos, the island of Patmos, and after eight days 
voyaging on the "great sea," we land at Smyrna and find 
a home at the same hotel, with the same proprietor, at 
which we lodged when we were here nine years ago. The 
three weeks spent in this part of Asia Minor included a 
visit to the Seven Churches of Asia. We found the Arch- 
bishop at Smyrna a very pleasant, fatherly man. Our 
letter of introduction from Jerusalem gave us a cordial 
reception both here and at Philadelphia. Our interviews 
with the bishops in Asia Minor resulted in about what has 
already been given as the result of our talk with the Patri- 
arch of Jerusalem. 

Taking Smyrna as a starting-point, the Seven Churches 
of Asia are situated the following distances from the city: 

Ephesus, 48 miles Sardis 77 mi l es 

Pergamos, 128 miles Philadelphia, 105 miles 

Thyatira, 116 miles Laodicea, 156 miles 

Except Laodicea these were all visited in turn, and, 
except Philadelphia and Smyrna, all the places are in 
ruins. At Pergamos, Ephesus, Philadelphia and Sardis 
remains of the ancient churches are to be seen, but at the 
other places all traces have been obliterated. 

Again taking ship at Smyrna, we sail away for sunny 
Greece, where we spend some time in Athens. We revisit 



590 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



the fallen temples, Mars' Hill, the Acropolis and other 
places of interest. Then by rail we go to Corinth, the site 
of the ancient church to which Paul addressed the two 
Epistles to the Corinthians. Corinth was in Paul's time 
one of the most populous and wealthy cities of Greece. 
But its riches produced pride, ostentation, and all the vices 
that come with great wealth not consecrated to the ac- 
complishment of good. Lasciviousness and lust of the 
vilest description were not only tolerated, but consecrated 
here by the worship of the goddess Venus. In the name 
of the goddess sensuality reigned supreme. It was about 
A. D. 52 when Paul reached Corinth the first time on his 
missionary tour. After preaching to the Areopagites on 
Mars' Hill he "departed from Athens, and came to 
Corinth."* Here he found Aquila and his wife Priscilla, 
tent-makers, and he lodged with them, working at his 
trade and supporting himself. He spent a year and a 
half in the city, preaching the Word of Truth and turning 
many people to Christ. During this visit to Corinth he 
wrote the Epistle to the Thessalonians. A few years later 
he visited the church here again, and it was during this 
latter visit that he wrote the Letter to the Romans. 

Silvanus and Timotheus joined Paul at Corinth and 
assisted him in his important work. When he pressed the 
great central truth of Christianity, "that Jesus was the 
Christ," upon the Jews, they opposed him and blasphemed, 
and the apostle said to them, "Your blood be upon your 
own heads; I am clean: from henceforth I will go unto 
the Gentiles. "f Among the Gentiles he met with much 
success and soon organized a church. Apollos followed 

*Acts 18: 1. 
fActs 18: 6. 



Wanderings in bible lands. 591 

him in his labors at Corinth and Aquila and Sosthenes were 
among the early ministers in the church at that place. 

The once proud City of Corinth is now but a wretched 
modern village. Seven columns of an exceedingly ancient 
temple of the Doric order are the only ruins that are left 
to bear witness to the departed greatness of the old Greek 
city. 

At Corinth we have an opportunity to see the new 
ship canal now nearing completion. The isthmus is 
pierced and the waters of the gulfs of Lepanto and 
Aegina are united. Periander, of Corinth (B. C. 625), 
was the first to suggest the canal, and work was actually 
begun on this important water way by the Roman Emperor 
Nero. The belief that there was a difference in the water 
level of the two gulfs caused its abandonment. Not until 
1 88 1 was the work again undertaken. The French, flushed 
with the success of the Suez Canal, undertook this, and it 
was finally completed and opened to traffic Aug. 6, 1893. 
The length of the canal is only about four miles, and yet 
it cost the enormous sum of thirteen and a half million 
dollars. It is seventy-five feet wide and the depth of 
water is twenty-six and four-tenths feet. It shortens the 
distance from the Adriatic to Asia Minor ports one hun- 
dred and eighty-five miles. 

From Corinth the road skirts the waters of the gulf 
and the scenery is beautiful. The farmers, men and 
women, are busily engaged in their vineyards, spading the 
ground and pruning the vines. In this part of Greece is 
grown the fruit known as the Zante currants of commerce, 
which are largely used in the United States. They are not 
currants, but small grapes growing on vines, and are dried 
very much the same as raisins are prepared for market. 



592 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



During the afternoon as we are crossing Greece the 
sky becomes overcast with clouds, and when we reach 
Patros, the end of our railway journey, the rain is coming 
down in torrents. We are quickly transferred from the 
depot to the steamer Venus, and in a few hours we 
steam away for Corfu and Brindisi. A pleasant voyage 
of twenty-four hours and we land in Italy again; then 
taking an express train we reach the Eternal City in 
twenty-four hours. At Rome we receive our long-delayed 
mail, and we have the first news from home for many 
weeks. The letters contain cheering news of good health, 
and our hearts beat high with hopes of soon reaching home 
again. 

Ten days are spent in the Imperial City. The Cata- 
combs, the Coliseum, the Forum, the Pincian Hill, the 
Halls of Caesar, St. Peter's, the Vatican and other places 
are revisited. At the Vatican we saw the Pope surrounded 
by all the pomp of royalty. Then by rail we hurry on, 
Passing Pisa with its leaning tower we are again in Genoa 
and on board the Kaiser Wilhelm ready for the hour of 
sailing to come. Capt. Stormer bids us welcome, and we 
meet a number of the passengers who came over on the 
Kaiser in November. At high noon we steam away from 
Genoa and set our faces homeward. We sail along the 
coast of Italy and Spain and cast anchor for a few hours 
again at the beetling rock of Gibraltar. And then steering 
westward we steam away for the port of New York. 
Capt. Stormer, to show his passengers a pleasure, steered 
the ship close to the south side of one of the Azores 
Islands. It was a pleasant sight to see the beautiful 
villages, the green fields, and other evidences of the pros- 
perity of the people living here on the small islands far out 
in the Atlantic. 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



593 



From the Azores we had a pleasant voyage with the 
exception of a two days' storm and an experience of only 
a few hours with a hurricane. The wind had been blowing 
a gale from the southwest and the ship rolled and pitched 
heavily. About four in the afternoon a heavy thunder- 
storm came up and the wind veered to the northwest. 
The captain immediately changed the course of the ship, 
placing the prow in face of the oncoming hurricane. We 
were in the gentlemen's room on deck. The atmosphere 
took on a yellow, copperish hue, and then the storm struck 
the ship. The wind blew at the rate of eighty miles an 
hour. Such was the pressure of the wind that it bore 
the waves down. As we watched this war of the elements, 
suddenly sea line and sky line were obliterated. The 
wind had assumed the form of a cyclone and was lifting and 
whirling the water in the air. The ship was enveloped 
in spray and water. Several heavy peals of thunder added 
to the noise of the raging elements. The wind blew with 
such force that the ship made but little progress. The fog 
horn was sounded, and for about a quarter of an hour we 
had the continuous roar of the fog signal. Then the storm 
cloud broke away, the wind abated and the ship again 
resumed her course. She had weathered the hurricane 
gallantly, and well she might, for she was built for storms. 
To us it was a new experience at sea. 

The rest of the homeward voyage was uneventful, and 
at last we are steaming into the harbor of New York. 
Yonder floats the flag over the land of the free. At quar- 
antine we stop to take on board the health and revenue 
officers. The revenue boat brings mail for the passengers, 
and how eager all are to receive news. Here is a letter 
from my dear wife, postmarked at Philadelphia, and I 



594 



WANDERINGS IN BIBLE LANDS. 



know without breaking the seal that in a few hours she will 
meet me at the wharf in New York. 

There are experiences that lay so close to our hearts 
that we are loath to speak or write about them. They are 
treasured as memories that live in our heart of hearts. 
Such an experience was my home coming and the meeting 
with my beloved life companion with whom I have jour- 
neyed for more than a quarter of a century. Over it all 
I drop the veil of silence as I write the closing words of 
this volume. God is good, and, oh, how good he has been 
to us! 





Scriptural Index. 



Genesis 3" 19 


18"? 


Fxodus 14* 22 


/I9C 










" 12: 10 


. HO 


" 14: 28 






513 


" 14: 30 


. . . 264, 425 


" 23: 17, 18 . . . 


510 


" 15: 1-19 




23: 19 


45 


15:23,24 


428 






15:25 


431 


25:8,9 ... . 


45 


" 16: 1 


448 


25:30-34 • • • 




" 16: 2 


448 


3o:37-43 • • ■ 


• • 445 


" 16: 3 


. . • 389, 448 


3 r = 49 


547 




449 


37: 24 


553 




454 


37: 34- • • • - 


v .- • v • • • 169 


" 19: 16-18 


. . : . . .452 


" 41: 45 


338 


" 2I: 33. 34 


553 


" 42:2 






55i 


46: 29 


366 


32:4 




47:3 


387 


35:23 


486 


" 47: 5. 6 ... . 






569 




-2X/I 




168 




I84 


n:33 


329 


50: 2, 3 ... . 




13: 22 


380 




tR-2 


Numbers 1: 3 


• 387 






33: 2-8 


436 


" T* 8 




33: 5 


366 


" 1: 11 


363. 366 


33: 6 

33: 10 ..... . 


-436 

447 


1: 13, 14 . . . 


367 


1:14 


. . . 142, 230, 371 


Deuteronomy 6: 4 .• . . . 


348 


2:23 


232, 234 


6: 11 ... . 


548. 


3:5 


355 


7:i3 ••• • 


549 


3:io 


232 


" 9: 12 ... . 


161 


5:2 


253 


" 11: 10, 11 . . 


149 


5:i2 


37i 


" 11: 11 ... . 


. . . 266, 501 


8:19 


253 


" 11:14 ... - 


...... 549 








549 


11: 4, 5 ... . 


260 




55o 


" 12: 29 


259 


" 28: 40 ... . 


• • • 548, 549 




. 263 




523 




437, 440 


9:i3 


523 


14:3. . . 


437. 441 






14: s 


263 
















437 










" 10: 23, 26 


201 



595 



596 



SCRIPTURAL INDEX. 



Joshua ii: i 194 

IS: 8 502 

Judges 3: 31 493 

Ruth 4: 1-12 5io 

1 Samuel 4: 18 5" 

" 17: 34-37 • • 5oi 

2 Samuel 3: 27 

4:18 • • 

5:i8 

5: 20 

5:2S 

15:6 

IS: 30 

i8:5 



5ii 

........ .511 

502 

502 

502 

5ii 

• S34 

-5H 

18: 24-33 • • • 5i2 

1 Kings 5: i7, 18 534 

8: 1, 23, 27 535 

14:25 .232 

14: is, 26 221 

18:44 • • 586 

i8:44,45 557 

18: 44-46 ii5 

2 Kings 3: 27 546 

4:22-37 587 

23: 29 232 

25:7 372 

1 Chronicles 8: 12 . . . 494 

27: 27 572 

27: 28 549 

2 Chronicles 32: 28 549 

Nehemiah 11: 35 494 



Job 2: 12 . . . 

" 28: 1-11 . . 

" 28:19 . . . 
Psalms 18: 42 . 
" 19:1,2 



169 
444 
285 
517 
106 
500 
500 
89 
553 
559 
285 
380 
89 



23:1,2 

23:4 

39: 4 

" 40: 2 . . 

44:i4 

68:31 

78:12 

104:32 

Il8: 22 .126 

119: 176 501 

" 129: 6, 7 482 

" 136: 15 .264 

Proverbs 25: 25 3 2 4 

27: 15 482 

28: 10 553 

30: 33 524 

Ecclesiastes 12: 5 168 



Isaiah 11: 15 . . . . 
" 14: 16-19 • • 
" 14: 18 . . / 
" 17:6 ... . 
■ " 19:6,7 •• • 
" 19: 19 . . . . 

19: 19-25 . . 
" 22: 23 ... . 
" 30: 14 ■ • • • 
«• 32:2 .. . . 
" 36:6 . . . . 
" 37: 27 ... • 
" 40: 11 . . . . 
" 52:4 ... 
" 53:2 ... 

54: 14 ... 
" 55:1 .. . 
" 63:2,3 • • 
Jeremiah 18: 1-6 . 

31:38-40 
31:40 • 
42: 15-17 
43: 2 . . 
43: 5-7 - 
43: 8— 11 
43:i3 • 
44: 3o • 
46: 7, 8 . 



329, 



74. 



144 
154 
247 
550 
178 
112 
465 
563 
559 
. 224 
. 199 
• 483 
. 500 
. 248 
80 
80 
116 
57i 



. . . 566 
568, 57o 

• • - 373 

• • - 373 

• • - 373 

• • - 374 

• • - 343 
. . .372 
. . . 144 



46: 19 152, 157 

Lamentations 1:1 545 

Ezekiel 4: 9 522 

12:15 559 

" 26: 3-5 587 

29: 3, 6 324 

29: 10 271 

30: 4, 7 2g 5 

30: 4, 8. 13-18 324 

30: 13 326 

" 30:14 382 

30: 16 218 

Daniel 6: 10 • 5*8 



Hosea 14: 6 . . 
Joel 1: 10 . . . 

" 2: 24 . . . 

" 3: 10 . . • 
Amos 9:9... 
Micah 7: 14 . - 
Nahum 3: 8, 9 . 

3:9 . . 
Zephaniah 1: 5 
Zechariah 2: 4 . 

14: 10 



548 

549 
548 
493 
559 
500 

215 

285 
483 
566 
566 



SCRIPTURAL INDEX. 



597 



Matthew 2: 15 no 

7:i4. - • • • • 5i3 

8: 2-4 532 

12:11. . , .553 

16: 18 513 

18:12 501 

21 5 536 

21:9 537 

21:33 572 

23: 27 . . 541 

23: 37-39 542 

24: 2 67 

" 26: 6-13 554 

w 26: 38 538 

27: 59» 60 46 

28: 19 576 

Mark 2: 4 481 

" 10: 47 487 

Luke 2: 8 547 

" 5: 37, 38 523 

9: 62 492 

" 10: 38-42 554 

" 12: 3 483 

" 13: 25 5i3 

" 14: 5 553 

" 21: 24 563 

si 22: 44 538 

i; 24: 50, 51 555 

° J 24: 52 545 

John 2: 14 521 

" 10: 3-5 499 

" 10: 11 501 

" 10: 14 499 

" 11 554 

" n:3 555 

" n: 11 40 

" 11: 18 554 

" 11:21 555 

" 11: 25, 26 556 

" 11: 38 46, 554 

" 11: 43 556 

" 13 - • - 577 

" 13: 1 526 

" 13: 9 527 

" 13: 14, 15 527 

" 13: i7 527 

" s I3:34>35 527 

" 15: 1, 2, 6 573 

Acts 1: 9-12 545 

" 8: 27 285 



Acts 9: 32 . . . .... .472 

" 9:32-35 • -494 

" 9: 33 • • • • 484 

" 9: 39 • 484 

" 10: 5 478 

" 10: 6 478 

" 10:9 478 

" 18: 1 590 

" 18: 6 590 

" 27: 13 106 

" 28: 13, 14 52 

" 28: 15 51 

" 28: 16 . 56 

" 28: 30, 31 29, 57 

Romans 9: 20, 21 328 

11: 17 549 

11: 24 549 

11:25,26 563 

16: 12 65 

16: 16 , 578 

1 Corinthians 5:7 163 

11: 5 321 

i5'- 6 40 

I5--32 588 

15:33 -161 

16:20 578 

2 Corinthians 13: 12 578 

Philippians 1: 12, 13 57 

1:13- • • - 66 

" 1 : 20, 21 58, 60 

" 2: 23, 24 60 

" 4: 22 66 

Colossians 4: 12 66 

1 Thessalonians 4: 14 40 

4: 15 40 

5:26 578 

2 Timothy 4: 6-8 61 

" 4: 16 60 

" 4: 21 60 

Philemon 1: 10 66 

" 1:22 60 

1:23 66 

Hebrews 1:1 182 

9: 19 478 

11: 25 154 

11: 28 . 163 

1 Peter 5: 14 " ' 578 

Revelation 14: 20 572 

M 19: i5 572 



Abbott Papyrus 246 

Abd er-Rasul brothers 234 

Abu-Sir 321 

Abydos, ruins of 211 

Abydos Tablet 213 

Adonizedek to king of Egypt .... 196 

Agape, picture of 5° 

Agates - 322 

Aground at Dekkeh 297 

Ahmed Abd er-Rasul, visit to .... 249 

Alexandria 414, 417 

Alexandria, library of 4*4 

Alexandria, St. Mark at 415 

Alexandria, church at 415 

Alexandria, first Christian school at . 414 
Alexandrian Library, destruction of . . 416 

American Colony, the 564 

Amherst Papyrus 246 

Ampliatus 65 

Antioch 588 

Apis, sacred bulls of 158 

Appian Way 51 

Appii Forum 54 

Arab kindness to animals i77 

Arch of Titus -._ 68 

Ash heap, a great 569 

Assiut . 20s 

Assuan 271 

Assuan center of caravan trade .... 272 

Asia and Africa 432 

Ata-Kah mountains 427 

Baptistry at Pisa .27 

Baptism in Coptic church 334 

Barbrosa, village of 320 

Bedrachin i$8 

Begging in Italy 98 

Beggars, our 5 T 3 

Beni Hassan 180 

Beni Hassan, tombs at 188 

Beni Hassan, work at 191 

Bethany, a visit to 553 

Bible lands, advantage of travel in . . 108 

Bible knowledge, lack of 343 

Bible history, confirmation of 202 

Bisharin, the , 273 

598, 



Bitter Lakes 422 

Bittir . : 497 

Blind, the, in Palestine 487 

Bottle mender, a 523 

Brick-making 230 

Bricks without straw 368 

Brick work of Pharaoh's house in Tah- 

panhes 375 

Brick makers at work 394 

Brick-making, picture representing . . 395 
Burning the dead at Rome in Paul's 

time 40, 62 

Burning of Rome by Nero 58 

Buried cities, discovery of 364 

Cairo 112, 330, 331 

Cairo, leaving 419 

Cairo, street scenes in 113 

Camel ride, a 274 

Camel, the 274 

Camel Corps, the 319 

Campo Santo at Genoa 25 

Catacombs at Rome 34 

Catacombs, extent of . . 46 

Catacombs, bird 394 

Catacombs at Alexandria 417 

Cemetery at Assiut 207 

Chicago Board of Trade compared with 

the Egyptians 269 

Christ, head of 74 

Christ, portrait of 76 

Christ, statue of at Cesarea 83 

Christ, second coming of 124 

Christ, figure of 318 

Christian persecution 59 

Chrysostom on Paid _^ . . . . 57 

Churches and Cathedrals at Rome . . 71 
Church and Mosque side by side ... 458 

Churning 524 

Circumcision in Coptic church .... 336 

Cisterns or pits 55 2 

Coffins, kinds of 185 

Coliseum 3 2 

Colossi of Memnon 234 

Columbaria 62 

Consular Road 54 

Convent at Gebel et-Tir 192 



INDEX. 



599 



Convent at Sinai, visit to 458 

Coptic monastery and church 213 

Copts, the 331 

Coptic church, a visit to 333 

Coptic church, patriarch of 333 

Coptic belief as to nature of Christ . . 334 

Coptic church, conflict in 336 

Coptic church, claims of patriarch in . 337 
Coptic church troubles settled .... 337 

Corinth 590 

Crete 106 

Crocodiles 290, 317 

Crossing the Red Sea, where 435 

Crossing the Red Sea, views as to . . . 437 

Date palm, the 178 

Dead, mourning for the * * * 167 

Death at sea 14 

Deir-el-Bahari 247 

Delta of the Nile 410 

Dervishes, Dancing and Howling . . . 350 

Dervishes are Moslem monks 352 

Destruction of Jerusalem 68 

Dishonest milkmen 87 

Donkey riding 114 

Donkeys and donkey-boys 116 

Dorcas, house of 477 

Dorcas, raising of, from the dead . . . 484 

Dough, making 287 

Dragoman, our old 467 

Dress in the wilderness 446 

Dust, putting, on grain 173 

Edfou 269 

Egypt, landing in 107 

Egypt, history of 109 

Egypt, farewell to 465 

Egypt, her future 46$ 

Egyptians, condition of 151 

Egyptian history 253 

Egyptian history, divisions of 253 

Egyptian church, excommunication of 332 
Egyptian church, persecution of . . . 332 

Elephantine, island of 276 

Embalming the dead 184 

Esneh 267 

Ethiopia 285 

Extravagant expenditure in churches . 75 

Famine, the 144 

Famines, allusions to . . 190 

Famine, a 279, 280 

Feast of love 41 

Feast of love in Coptic church .... 336 
Feet-washing in Coptic church .... 334 



Fellahs, condition of 167 

First cataract 271 

Five kings, slaughter of 201 

Frescoes in the catacombs at Rome . . 49 

Funerals , 167 

Funeral rites 186 

Funeral processions 186, 208, 406 

Gates, sitting and trading in the . . . 570 

Gates, the strait 513 

Gebel et-Tir 192 

Genoa 19, 23 

Genoa to New York 592 

Golden candlestick 71 

Golden calf of the Israelites 160 

Goshen, Land of ... - • in 

Grand Gallery 126, 132, 133 

Granite coffins at Sakkara 159 

Granite column with inscriptions . . . 279 

Granite quarries 278 

Granite temple 138 

Grass on the housetop 482 

Grave robbing 246 

Greek church, baptism in the 576 

Greek church, feet-washing in the . . 577 
Greek church, feast of love in the . . . 577 
Greek church, holy kiss in the .... 578 
Greek church, position in Jerusalem . 579 

Greek church, teaching of 580 

Greek church, number of adherents . 582 
Greek and Latin church division ... 579 

Grinding at a mill 274 

Guide, an importunate 24 

Hananeel, tower of 567 

Head of Christ, description of by Len- 

tulus , 81 

Hebrew invasion of Canaan .... 194, 196 

Heliopolis 338 

Herodotus on the Great Pyramid . . 123 

Hill of the Jews in 

Homeward bound 3 2 3 

Horseshoe, finding a 322 

Hurricane on the Atlantic 593 

Immortality, Egyptian belief in . . . .180 

Inhabitants of the Delta 413 

Inscriptions in the Catacombs .... 44 

Inscription of Damasus 49 

Interview with archbishop's represent- 
ative 333 

Irrigating, manner of 148 

Irrigating with a basket 172 



6oo 



INDEX. 



Ismailia in, 422 

Israelites leave Egypt 263 

Israelites in the Land of Goshen . . . 363 

Israelites, return of, to Egypt 374 

Israelites in Egypt 387 

Israelites murmuring in the desert . . 389 
Israelites compared with Christians . 390 

Israelites, murmuring of 448 

Israelites at Rephidim 449 

Israelites at Mt. Sinai 449 

Italian navy 105 

Jacob, arrival of, in Egypt 190 

Jacob, reception of, in Egypt 361 

Jacob and Joseph, meeting of 366 

Jaffa, landing at 466 

Jaffa, chief boatman at 468 

Jaffa, an old city 469 

Jaffa, improvements at 471 

Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway 471 

Jaffa oranges 477 

Jaffa, commerce of 477 

Jaffa, tanneries at 485 

Jaffa, market-place of 486 

Jaffa Gate, the 509 

Jebel Musa 452 

Jerusalem, capture of, by Nebuchad- 
nezzar 372 

Jerusalem, arrival at 503 

Jerusalem, gates of 506 

Jerusalem, streets of 514 

Jerusalem, pilgrims to 519 

Jerusalem, bazaars of 521 

Jerusalem, a new 56$ 

Jerusalem, ancient library at 578 

Jerusalem, farewell to 584 

Jerusalem to Jaffa 584 

Jews a persecuted people 558 

Jews' wailing place 560 

Jews, future of 563 

Kahmus favorite son of Rameses II . 252 

Kalabshi 290 

King's Chamber 126, 132, 135 

King's Chamber, coffin in ....... 135 

Korasko, 299 

Koran, the . . 345 

Koran and Bible compared 346 

Koran, duties enjoined by 349 

Koran, the text-book 359 

Land of Goshen 364, 384 

Land of Goshen, richness of soil . . .388 
Land of Goshen, borders not known . 390 
Land of Goshen, a ride across the . . 392 
Land of Goshen, birds of the ..... 392 



Land of Goshen, leaving the 421 

Law, place of giving 453 

Leaning tower at Pisa 28 

Leaky roofs 482 

Lentiles 521 

Lepers 531 

Letters found at Memphis 369 

Lotus plant in Egypt 178 

Lud . . . ". 494 

" Madame Nubia " 295 

Man, a sorry 402 

Market-place at Assuan 272 

Market, a village 395 

Marah 428 

Marriage 446 

Melchisedec 126 

Memphis 152 

Menephthah II 252 

Menephthah II, statue of 255 

Menephthah II, death of his son . . . 257 
Menephthah II, humiliation of ... . 263 

Milking cows in street 86 

Miriam's song of triumph 424 

Missionary spirit, the true 404 

Mission schools, American 404 

Mohammedanism, reason for success of 348 

Mohammedan worship 350 

Mohammedan Sabbath 350 

Mohammedan belief as to women . . .355 
Mohammedan justice, specimen of 469, 58s 
Mohammedans, manner of life of . . . 359 
Mohammedans, few converted .... 406 

M<3hammedan hour of prayer 351 

Monuments confirm Scripture .... 261 
Moslem religion, composition of . . . 345 

Moslem devotions 351 

Moslems, intellectual condition of . . 359 

Moslem at prayer " " 517 

Mosque El Azhar 357 

Mountains of the Sinaitic peninsula . . 449 

Muezzin, the 351, 517 

Muski, the . . . . 406 

Mt. Carmel 586 

Naples 86 

New Testament, oldest MS. of ... . 460 

New York 593 

Nile, a sketch of the 143 

Nile, rise of 143 

Nile, overflow of 145 

Nile, difficulty of navigation on .... 164 

Nile, valley of 164 

Nile, branches of 410 



INDEX. 



60 1 



Nilometer, the . , . , 277 

Novel way of landing 223, 423 

Nubia 271, 285 

Nubians at home 286 

Obelisk 220 

Obelisk, an immense 272 

Obelisks at On 325, 34i 

Obelisk, the lonely 34 1 

Olivet, a day on . . • • ■ 533 

Olive tree, propagation of 549 

Olive oil, methods of obtaining .... 550 

On, Moses educated at 338 

On, remains of 342 

Overthrow of Egyptians 264 

Palatine Hill ■ 31 

Palestine, cities of 47o 

Palestine, desolation of 545 

Papyrus found at Zoan 381 

Papyrus in Egypt 178 

Paradise, the Mohammedan 349 

Patriarch of Greek church, visit to . . 574 

Paul's journey to Italy 53 

Paul's journey to Rome 56 

Paul's friends 58 

Paul ready to be offered 61 

Paul's execution 61 

Pharaoh of oppression 182 

Pharaoh, destruction of host of . . . .425 

Philse 277 

Fi-Beseth 366 

Picture, a great 5°5 

Pithom 363 

Pitbom, attempt to visit 391 

Plain of er-Rahah 453 

Plowing in Palestine 49 2 

Polygamy in Coptic church 336 

Pompeii 89 

Pompeii, baker's shop in 90 

Pompeii, excavated streets of 90 

Pompeii, form of body preserved in 

ashes 94 

Pompeii, morals of people of 97 

Pompeii, evidences of depravity in . . 98 

Pompey's Pillar 418 

Poor, home life of, in Italy 100 

Port Said 106 

Potteries at Keneh 3 2 7 

Potter at his wheel 327 

Praying on the housetop 478 

Prophecy, fulfillment of . . . 178, 325* 566 

Proclaiming from housetop 483 

Pursuit of Egyptians 263 



Puteoli, Paul's landing-place 52 * 

Pyramids, visit to 12c 

Pyramids at Sakkara 161 

Pyramids as tombs 186 

Pyramid, the Great 12c 

Pyramid, the Great, entrance to . . . 133 
Pyramid, the Great, meaning of . . . 125 
Pyramid, the Great, purpose of . . . .127 
Pyramid, the Great, climbing of . . . 128 
Pyramid, the Great, view from top of . 130 
Pyramid, the Great, interior of .... 132 
Pyramid, the Great, measurements of 132 
Pyramid, the Great, when built .... 123 

Quarries at Assuan 272 

Queen's Chamber 132 

Raameses 363 

Railway from Haifa to Damascus . . .476 

Raising water with a basket 396 

Rameses II, statue of 154. 224 

Rameses II 233, 300 

Rameses II, finding body of 236 

Rameses II, unwrapping mummy of . 243 
Rameses II, appearance of body of . . 243 
Rameses II, of Assyrian extraction . . 248 

Rameses II, his family 252 

Rameses II, statue of, at Abou Simbel 301 
Rameses II, picture glorifying .... 306 
Rameses II in the land of Tah . , . .313 

Rameses II in battle 3U 

Rameses II, statue of at Zoan 382 

Ramleh 495 

Ras Sufsafeh 452 

Ras Sufsafeh, the mount of the law . . 453 

Ras Sufsafeh, ascent of 453 

Ras Sufsafeh, view from top of .... 454 

Red Sea, passage through 264 

Red Sea. the 424 

Red Sea, coral of 433 

Religion of inhabitants of the wil- . . 

derness 447 

Ride on the desert 398 

Ride through a marsh 401 

Rock of Gibraltar 17 

Rome 30 

Rome again 59 2 

Sacred wolf, tombs of 208 

Saft el-Henneh ..-371 

Sais, or outrunners n5 

Sakka, or water-carrier 115 

Sakka, the 409 

Sakkara ■ m 

Sakkieh - U5. 172. 284, 412 

Samson and the foxes , , , , 49^ 



602 



INDEX. 



Sand-storm , , 211 

Sarras 1 * . . 320 

Scarab 208 

School at On ,338 

Schoolmaster in Egypt 174 

Sea voyages 12 

Second cataract 321 

Sehel, island of 279 

Serapeum 158 

Seti Menephthah' 260 

Seti Menephthah, statue of 261 

Seven Churches in Asia 589 

Seven Ruins, the . . . . 502 

Shaduf, fathers of 149 

Shaduf, the 145, 172, 284, 412 

Sharon, plain of 496 

Shepherds of Palestine ........ 499 

Ship's engines 21 

Shishak 221, 365 

Simon the tanner, house of 477 

Sinai 161, 451 

Sinai, ascent of 456 

Sinai, hermits of 459 

Sleeping-places 40 

Soldiers • • • 282 

Song of deliverance 425 

Southern Cross, the 309 

Spain, coast of 18 

Sphinx, the 137 

Starting point of the Israelites .... 436 

Statue of Rameses' queen 303 

Steam not used to raise water 150 

Step Pyramid 161 

Stocking a ship 19 

Store chambers at Pithom ..... 367 

Stromboli 106 

St. Peter's 72 

St. Peter, statue of 74 

St. Paul's Cathedral 74 

Students, life of, at Cairo . 357 

Succoth 366 

Suez Canal no, 422 

Suez . 422 

Suez, leaving 462 

Sugar factory at Maghaghah 192 

Sycamore tree, an old 342 

Syene 272 

Table of showbread . 71 

Tahpanhes 372 

Tahpanhes, excavations at 375 

Tahpanhes, clay cylinder at 377 

Tahpanhes, decoration of 379 

Tahpanhes, articles found at ..... 379 



Tanta, fairs of . ........ 411 

Tarsus 58& 

Teaching in Cairo 357 

Teachers, life of 357, 359 

Tell el Amarna 193 

Tell el Amarna Tablets 193 

Tell el Amarna Tablets, date of . . . .195 
Tell el Amarna Tablets, translation of . 19b 
Tell el Hesy Tablets ......... 203 

Tell el Yehudiyeh . . .• 419 

Temples of Egypt 180 

Temple of Tih 161 

Temple of Seti I 213 

Temple of Rameses II 213 

Temple of Karnac 220 

Temple at Esneh 267 

Temple at Edfou 269 

Temple at Kalabshi 292 

Temple at Kalabshi, inscriptions in . 292 

Temple at Dekkeh 294 

Temples of Abou Simbel ..... 300, 304 
Temples of Abou Simbel, visit to . . . 309 
Temple, smaller, at Abou Simbel . . .311 

Temple of Abahudah 318 

Temple of the Sun at On 338 

Temple of Turn at Pithom ..... 365 

Thebes . . 215 

Thebes, ruins of 218 

Three Taverns 51, 55 

Tischendorf's search and discovery . . 459 

Titus . . . . ■ 68 

Tombs, interest of 158 

Tombs of Egypt 180 

Tombs, construction of ........ 182 

Tombs, contents of 181 

Tombs, decorations of 188 

Tombs, description of rock-cut .... 189 

Tombs of Ameni 190 

Tombs of the Kings 223 

Tombs of the Kings, decorations of . . 226 

Tombs, pillaging of 246 

Travelers, usual route of . . . -U . . 409 

Trees of Egypt 178 

Tryphena and Tryphosa 65 

Turkish justice, illustration of .... 585 
Tyre, destruction of 587 

University at Cairo 356, 357 

Valley of the Tombs . . . 224 

Veiling the face 320 

Vesuvius 87 

Vesuvius, climbing to crater of .... 88 

Vesuvius, explosion at 89 

Vesuvius, last sight of . . 105 



INDEX. 



Virtue and vice contrasted 



320 



Wady Halta 318 

Wady Haifa, garrison at 319 

Wages in Italy 100 

Wages in Palestine 475 

Wall tablets at Mt. Silsilis 260 

Water-carriers 173 

Wedding procession 406 



Wells of Moses, trip to . . . . 

Wells' of Moses 

Wilderness, the Sinaitic . . . . 
Wilderness, inhabitants of 

Wine presses, the 

Women, condition of, in Italy 
Women, degradation of ... . 

Zimpel, Charles 

Zoan, objects found at ruins 



« 




1 



• 

1 



